The Satellite Series
by boro-girl
Summary: What about the moments we didn't see in "Second Chance"? The stories not told, the scenes cut away from, the cause and the consequence of so many little things.
1. Welcome

Welcome to the Satellite Series.

This is not an "author's note". Nu uh. I don't do those. I believe that stories stand alone and shouldn't need me talking about them!

This is... more an "author's introduction".

See, I loved writing 'Second Chance'. Really loved it. When I finished writing it I found that I was missing it which was very, very weird! Then one day I was chatting with a friend (fan, beta, wonderful person) and I got talking about one bit in the fic which I kinda wanted to expand on... And I did. Before I knew it I was planning and writing all these one-shots to go with 'Second Chance'. They're not sequels or missing chapters, more... additional information.

Little bits that are orbiting 'Second Chance'.


	2. Little One

Sarah sat on the cold wooden bench and placed her feet on the edge, hugging her knees to her chest. The words rang in her head: _You are indeed pregnant, Mrs Dalton. I would say about six weeks from the dates you've given me._

Pregnant.

Again.

"Anyone sat here?"

Sarah snapped out of her thoughts and looked up at the young woman standing in front of her. She shook her head before resting her chin on her knees.

"You OK?" the girl asked, tucking her flame-red hair behind her ear. "Good or bad news?"

"Hmm?"

"Young woman sat outside the maternity wing?" The girl glanced at the hands clasped around Sarah's legs. "Wedding ring... So, good news or not?"

"Don't know," Sarah admitted.

"What? You don't know if you're pregnant or...?"

"No, I'm pregnant."

"And you're not sure if you want it?"

"I'm not sure if I can keep it."

"Right."

Sarah looked over at her. "It's not what you're thinking."

"And what am I thinking?" the girl replied with a grin.

"I've had five miscarriages."

"Ouch."

"Yeah. Ouch."

"So you're scared?"

"Terrified," Sarah admitted. "And I don't know what's going to happen. Am I just going to lose this baby too? It's like..." She sighed and turned her head back 'round, resting her chin on her knees again. "When I fell pregnant the first time, Peter and I, we were so happy."

"Peter's your husband?"

"Yeah. We'd only just started to try and we thought our luck was in. Made it to ten weeks, just one of those things. It was hard and it hurt but we picked ourselves back up. Waited a few months like they suggested, and we tried again. That time it was only six weeks."

"Five times?" the girl whispered.

"Each time we just thought, 'this is it, this time we'll be a family'. When I first fell pregnant, when I told him I was late? He was _so_ excited. We both were. I remember going to the doctor's for the test results. When the doctor said yes, I was pregnant, I don't know how we did it, but we just sat there calmly, nodded, and thanked him. Then we left as soon as we were outside Peter picked me up and spun me around.

"The second time he gave me a hug. The third it was a kiss. The last two... we just looked at each other and we smiled but you could see it in our eyes."

"It's only natural to be scared," the girl said, a hint of a Scottish accent drifting out. "God knows how I'd be after five..."

"I don't know if I want to tell him. Peter. If this is going to end badly then at least I can spare him that. Five times he's had to watch me... doubled over in pain, crying, knowing our baby is slipping away and he can't do anything to stop it. He hates it. He doesn't say it, but I know he hates it. He hates that he can't make it better, he hates that he can't protect me, but worse than that..."

"He can't protect his child," the girl finished.

"Yeah."

"Maybe this time will be different."

"Said that before."

"Maybe..."

"And what if it's not? Did you know that only one in four pregnancies actually goes to term?"

"Sounds like you're due a change in odds," the girl said. "You never know."

"I know what damage this is going do to Peter, to us, if it goes wrong."

"Who says it will? Tell him. You can't keep it secret. Even if... he needs to know."

"Unless..." Sarah began, the dark thought creeping back to the outreaches of her mind.

"Unless there's nothing to tell him? You don't seem like the kind of person who could do that."

"Do what?"

"That," the Scot said, her meaning clear.

"Make life easier."

"Right up until the point you have to look him in the eye."

Sarah sighed gently and put her feet down on the ground, moving her hands to her stomach.

"Looks to me like your mind is made up."

"I'm just..."

"Scared."

"Yeah."

"Just do what you think's right. The rest is out of your hands."

"I just want to be a mum."

"You are," the Scot said, "always have been. I can see it."

"What?" Sarah asked, turning to look at the woman.

"You've got this air about you. You're a mum. There's this... sense you have. Something I remember about my Mum. Everyone said that you knew she was a mum purely because of how she talked, how she looked. A look in her eye. You have it."

"But I'm not..."

"Yes," she corrected gently. "You are." Glancing at her watch, she smiled gently. "I should get off."

"Appointment?" Sarah asked.

"Something like that. Congratulations."

"Here's hoping."

The Scot smiled again and got to her feet.

"I'm Sarah by the way."

"I'm Amelia," the scot replied with a smile on her face.

Amy walked away from Sarah, almost bumping into the Doctor when she rounded the corner. "Oh do you really have to do that?"

"And?"

"Who is she to you?"

"Amy!"

"Who is she?"

"Did you talk to her or not? This is important, Amelia. Did you talk to her?"

Amy narrowed her eyes. "She's not another River is she?"

"What? No!"

"Then who is she?" she asked again, folding her arms.

"Someone very, very important, Amy. More important than you realise, and so is that baby she's carrying. So did you talk to her?"

"Yeah, we talked."

"She's keeping the baby?"

"Why the interest? Is it yours?" Amy quipped. "Alright!" she said in response to his glare. "Yeah, she'll keep it. But then you knew that already."

"Time doesn't work like that. Sarah kept the baby because you talked to her today. You don't talk to her, time gets re-written. No baby, no future... Just because I met her in my past doesn't mean it'll happen in the future."

"Does anything happen in the right order for you?"

"Everything's in the right order for me. It's just wrong for you. Not my fault."

"So who is she? Apart from someone important."

"Sarah is... an old friend. A very good old friend."

"You care about her."

The Doctor gave her a look which betrayed that Sarah was so much more than that. "That baby is so important, Amy. Nicole..."

"Nicole?"

"Sarah's going to have a daughter. Nicole Grace. Sarah in miniature. And she's brilliant, she really is. She's fantastic, Amy. Only she shouldn't exist. She's not supposed to be here."

"Do you ever make sense?"

"Long story. Sarah's reliving her past, changing things. In just under thirty years the Universe is going to take Peter from her because he was supposed to die. And thirty years from now it's going to come for Nicole. Because she shouldn't exist."

"Her daughter's going to die?" Amy protested. "You just had me convince her to... For that? That's cruel!"

"In thirty years' time, Sarah and Nicole are going to get caught between two rival bounty hunters after the same prize. And the Universe is going to protect itself and Nicole will be killed."

Amy's heart broke and she wanted to run back to Sarah and tell her everything, warn her. Then she saw the expression on the Doctor's face. "What happens?"

"What will always happen when a mother sees her child in danger."

"Sarah...?"

"Yeah," he breathed gently.

"And you're just going to sit back and let that happen?"

"Things happen, Amy, whether I want them to or not."

"But you..."

"Either Sarah dies or Nicole does. And I know her, Amy. I know her so very well. She won't hesitate, she won't regret it. She adores her kids, lives for them. And she'll die for Nicole. That's so very, very Sarah."

"But if there's no Nicole...?"

"Then Sarah lives on. Ripe old age. Long and happy and brilliant life. But she's the last of her line. Luke's her adopted son, but Nicole? That's flesh, that's blood. Nicole _is_ Sarah, Amy, and that's why she can go on. The Universe corrects itself because Nicole is Sarah and Sarah is Nicole. They're not just alike in terms of looks and personality, they _are_ alike.

"Sarah's grandkids, great-grandkids, great-great-grandkids. Generation after generation and Sarah Jane Smith lives on for centuries. Because she has that child, because she dies for that child. My Sarah Jane lives on."

"How can you just stand back and let that happen?"

The Doctor put his hands on Amy's shoulders, turning her around and pushing her towards the corner. They peered around, looking at Sarah who was still sat on the bench, her hands resting on her stomach.

"Because she is a mum. She has always been a mum. And because, if I walked over, and told her everything? That she'll have this baby, she'll be a mum to a brilliant little girl who'll grow up to be a brilliant young woman, but here's the catch... She'd still go for it. She will still do it."

"This is what it's like? Travelling with you?"

"Sometimes."

"Is she happy? Sarah?"

"Like you wouldn't believe."

"And Nicole will be OK?"

"Three kids with Scott. She's pregnant with the first when Sarah... A boy, Peter after her dad. Then Sarah, then..." He smiled as he turned Amy to look at him. "Then Amelia. You told Sarah your name. Guess she tells Nicole."

Amy glanced back over at Sarah, watching her get to her feet and go back into the building. Then she followed the Doctor back into the TARDIS.


	3. Mock Italian

Following the events in Chapter 6 of Second Chance (.net/s/5723306/6/Second_Chance)

* * *

"I know a little restaurant not far from here," he said in a low voice. His fingers moved against the soft fabric of the trousers she was wearing, a gentle caress of her leg. "We could go for a late lunch?"

"Sounds good to me."

He stood and held out his hand to her. As soon as she put hers in his she couldn't help but smile, all the more so when he pulled her to her feet. "Do you like Italian?"

Sarah could help but think about the time she and the Doctor were in Italy and the grin widened as she nodded. "Love it."

"It's nothing fancy..." he began as she picked up her bag, almost by way of an apology.

"I'm sure it'll be fine."

"Next time I'll make sure it's something a bit more... special."

"Next time?" she quipped. "You're confident."

"Something tells me that this is just the start of something," he whispered in her ear as he guided her towards the front door.

* * *

The restaurant was mock-Italian, trying to convince people that they were the real deal as they took your order in Cockney accents; Sarah and Peter had to stifle giggles as someone who was clearly from East London tried to speak with a heavy Italian accent.

"We can go somewhere else if you want," Peter said when the waiter had finally stopped showering Sarah with faux compliments.

"This is fine," she laughed softly, "really."

"The service isn't great but the food is nice."

"Peter, it's fine. Really."

"I just..."

"It's fine!" she snapped a bit harsher than she'd intended. "Sorry."

"No, I am. Just... nervous."

"Nervous? Why?"

"Because..." He sighed gently. "I've spent months trying to track you down. Since that meeting in the bar you've been... on my mind, Sarah. A lot. And now you're here, we're here..."

Since they'd left her flat Sarah had been reminding herself that this Peter was not her Peter. He was not the man she'd met, fallen in love with, and almost married.

Yet.

He would become that man, but right now he was younger, passionate, his whole life ahead of him... ahead of them?

* * *

After lunch they went for a walk, hand in hand, through the park. Then they got last minute tickets to a theatre play they'd never heard of, leaving half way through because they were laughing so much (and not in the good way) at the performances. Realising the time they found a bar and ordered some simple, honest food and a bottle of wine.

After what seemed like only an hour or two they were kicked out of the pub when it closed. They'd spent the whole afternoon together and barely noticed the time.

"Didn't you have to get back to work?" she asked as they walked towards the bus stop. "You went to my aunt's, found me..."

"I'm sick," he mock-coughed. "Took the rest of the day off."

"Tut tut," she laughed, linking her arm with his.

They fitted together so well – but she knew that already. Their first date (before) he'd offered his arm to her and escorted her to their table in the restaurant. Pulled it out for her, the perfect gentleman. And they'd fitted together well then.

"You OK?" he asked.

"I..." she began, but stopped as she felt the heavy drop on her sleeve.

The rain was sudden and almost torrential, and they made a dash for shelter, finding it in a nearby shop doorway.

"Here," Peter said when he noticed she'd started to shiver. Her thin summer coat was soaked through and so he removed his suit jacket.

"You'll be the one who freezes now," she pointed out, putting her hand on his arm to stop him. "Then you really will need a sick day."

He conceded the point and settled for wrapping an arm around her. "The next bus should be along soon," he said, glancing at her watch. "Sorry about this..."

"Will you stop apologising?" she laughed. "I... I had a really good time today, Peter."

"Me too," he smiled. For some reason the smile became a soft laugh and soon the pair of them were laughing at nothing in particular.

She couldn't help herself. She'd been almost desperate to do it from that first moment in the bar all those weeks ago. Sitting next to him, near him, touching his arm, holding his hand, fitting into his side... But she wanted more.

Pushing up onto her toes she pressed her lips to his, the kiss catching him by surprise.

"Sorry," she said when she stepped back. "I..." She couldn't think how to finish that sentence so she just shrugged.

"Are you?"

"What?"

"Sorry."

"...No," she smiled, catching his eye. That light was the same. Now, before, thirty years from now.

Her arms snaked around his neck as he lifted her body up and against his. Their lips met, parted, and buses came and went.

* * *

This was fast. Even with everything, this was fast. He had her pressed up against her front door – they'd given up fumbling for her keys – and all she could think of was that this was too fast.

(Then again she'd agreed to marry him after only a couple of months, but this was their first date. For him anyway.)

He felt her body language shift and he broke the kiss, his lips hovering near hers. "Sarah?"

"I can't do this," she breathed.

Peter nodded and stepped back.

"It's just..." She took a deep breath to think about what she could say, but Peter got there first.

"Who was he?" he asked.

"What?"

"The guy who broke your heart?"

_You_, she thought sadly. "He... It was a while ago, but..."

"Who left who?"

"It was... Mutual. He had to go, I had to stay... It wasn't because we didn't love each other. He left _because _he loved me. It hurt, it still hurts, but it was the right thing to do."

"I can't imagine leaving you," Peter whispered gently, holding her chin in his thumb and forefinger.

"Here's hoping," she whispered. She pushed up on her toes and kissed him gently. "Can we just..."

"Take it slow?" he finished. "Sure. OK."

"Thank you."

"Well... goodnight."

"Night."

He kissed her once more then started to walk down the hallway. "Saturday, seven," he called back. "Dress up."

She laughed softly, finally found her keys in her bag, and let herself into her flat.

* * *

"This is nice," Harry said as he finished chopping up the veg and swept it into the waiting pot.

"The soup?" Sarah asked, glancing at the bubbling stock.

"You. Me. Spending time together."

"We see plenty of each other," she pointed out, retrieving a piece of carrot that had escaped. She munched on the stick and looked at him. "What?"

"How's Peter?"

"He's fine," she replied in confusion.

"Surprised you're not staying at his."

"His place is tiny," she said, "and besides, we're taking things slow."

"Right."

She shot him a glance. "What?"

"Nothing."

"Harry."

"It's nothing."

"Out with it."

"It's just..." He sighed, looking at her stood across from him, arms folded.

When she'd called and said that her boiler had failed and it would be days before the required part could be fitted, he'd offered her his spare room without a second's hesitation. He'd wondered if he'd been her second call, and when she'd put him straight it had felt good. The wrong kind of good. But that hadn't stopped him enjoying the last few days and he found he wasn't looking forward to her going home tomorrow.

"Are you sure about him?" Harry asked.

"Peter?"

"No, Jesus."

"Where's this come from?" she asked.

"I'm just worried about you. What's going to happen if the Doctor comes back? Can't see you turning him down for Peter, old girl."

"Two things," she said calmly. "One, the Doctor isn't going to come back."

"You can't know that."

She ignored his remark because she _did_ know. "Second, what's that got to do with me and Peter?"

"You planning on telling him then?"

"What?"

"Or are you going to keep lying?"

"What's it got to do with you?"

"I care about you, Sarah. I don't want to see you get hurt."

"I'm not going to get hurt."

"You don't know that. This is going to go one of two ways, old girl. You'll tell him and he'll run a mile, or you'll keep it from him and the secret is going to eat you up. I know you, Sarah. You'll hate yourself for lying to him."

She said nothing, not because of what he'd said, but because of the bigger meaning of his words. If things progressed with Peter then she was going to have to lie to him for a long time – not about the Doctor and the TARDIS and her travels in space and time. But about her other life. Her past life, her future life.

"That's assuming he doesn't break your heart first," Harry continued.

"And why would he?" Sarah asked, snapping out of her train of thought. "He..." _loved me_, she finished, automatically defaulting to past tense. He loved her so much that he gave up his life, his chance to be with her. But she couldn't say that.

"I'm just saying..."

"Well don't," she snapped. "It's none of your business."

"I don't want to see you get hurt, old girl."

"I won't," she said firmly.

"And you know this how?"

* * *

She arrived on his doorstep freezing cold, having walked out in anger with only the clothes she had on. Peter hugged her, pulled her inside, and didn't ask why she'd turned up so late at night. As she watched him making her a hot chocolate to warm her up she couldn't help but think how close she'd been to having him in her life before. If she'd been at Lavina's that day, or if she'd taken up her aunt's offer to have her law firm sort out her own affairs.

But then that was this was about, right? This was her second chance.

"Harry and I had a fight," she told him eventually.

"I thought as much."

"What?"

"You get this look in your eye when you're really mad – it had faded but it was there when you turned up."

"Right."

"Saw it when that waiter tried to pick you up last week. Thought you were going to hit him," Peter laughed.

"He wasn't trying to pick me up," she pointed out, "he... had wandering hands. And I very nearly did hit him."

"I know, I was there."

"Right in the middle of it," she laughed. "I nearly hit you."

"I know that too," he smiled. "Very glad you didn't." He paused for a second, working up the courage to say, "Should I be asking what the fight was about?"

"Who," she corrected.

"OK. Should I be asking who the fight was about?" he began, then caught her eye. "Ah."

"Harry's one of my oldest friends," she sighed, cupping the mug in her hands. "We've been through so much together and I want... I need you two to get on. You're two of the most important men in my life and I don't want to feel like I'm stuck in the middle of something."

"You won't," Peter assured her, walking around to where she was perched on the stool. "I promise." He wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head.

"That's nice," she muttered, resting her head on his chest.

"What? This?" he asked, kissing her again.

"Mmm," she hummed in reply, listening to the thud-thud of his heart. "Can I stay here tonight?"

"You don't have to ask," he said, kissing her head a third time for good measure. "I'll find you something to sleep in while you have a shower. Go warm up."

* * *

Sarah stared at the ceiling, twisting one of the buttons on the shirt Peter had lent her. She didn't know what she had in mind but this wasn't it, she was sure of that. Trust him to insist that they stick to their 'take things slowly' agreement. Her in his bed, wearing little else than one of his old shirts (which soon had one less button on it as she twisted the thread to breaking point), and him on the sofa.

All because of some stupid fight she'd had with her best friend about the man she'd done so much for.

* * *

It was early when Sarah woke up and she ventured out to the kitchen, her bare feet padding on the floor. She jumped slightly when she saw Peter was already up, making himself a coffee. When he noticed her he pushed it in her direction and picked up a second mug.

"Sleep well?" he asked.

"Not really," she blurted out. Apparently her tact was still fast asleep and she winced at the concerned look on his face. Knowing him he was probably planning to go and buy a new mattress or something.

"Oh?"

She sighed gently. "Kept... thinking you were going to come in. Hard to sleep when you keep glancing at the door every thirty seconds, wondering if that noise I heard was you."

"Sarah," he said gently, "we agreed to take things slowly."

She could see that he was fighting the same thing she was, and the butterflies that had seemingly taken up residence in her stomach seemed to develop titanium wings.

"Yeah, we did. A while ago."

"I don't..." he began but he was silenced when she kissed him.

His arms snaked around her waist, holding her petite body against his. Her hands raked through his hair as the kiss deepened.

"You're sure?" he managed to whisper as their lips parted long enough to draw in air.

"Completely," she replied before they stumbled back to bed.

* * *

When she woke a second time the bed felt warmer, heavier. Peter's finger traced light patterns on her bare shoulder before he kissed it gently.

"I have to get to work," he whispered in her ear before kissing her neck.

"I should get back to the flat," she agreed. "The boiler guy is coming over to fit the part. Hot water at last."

"A part of me is hoping that it'll be broken for a little while longer," he laughed softly against her skin, his kisses moving across her body as he turned her to lie flat on the mattress.

"I'd miss my hot showers too much. Yours is rubbish. Look, I've got a lot on but there's nothing to stop you coming over later?"

"I'll bring the wine."

"Sounds good," she grinned before his mouth met hers.

They were late for work.


	4. Friends Reunited

Sarah moved along the rows, working almost on auto pilot. Her feet knew where to move, how to step, and so her mind was free to drift to unrelated matters. Sometimes she'd recall a simple memory of her and Peter, sometimes she would ponder on the bigger questions; her children, defending the Earth, what she would do for dinner that night.

Life had moved on and things had settled. On reflection Sarah was happy with it. She loved her family and friends, she loved what she did. On one recent birthday Nicole had quipped that her mother should join the ranks of superheroes. 'Mild mannered reporter' to the world, but underneath that was a strong, passionate, resourceful woman who thought nothing of saving the world before breakfast. Which, Nicole went on to add, Sarah was just as passionate about her children eating.

It is the most important meal of the day Sarah had laughed and then they'd all laughed. All of them around that table, her little family. Far from perfect but loved with a strength that sometimes took her by surprise. Not quite perfect but as close as they were going to get. The four of them.

Well, four and a half.

She'd known for weeks, long before Nicole. Whether her little one wasn't aware or wasn't telling that she didn't know, but almost from the start she had taken one look at her daughter, her dark and deep eyes aflame with life, love and strength, her body bursting with energy and enthusiasm, and Sarah had known that deep down inside that petite body was another spark of life.

Her first grandchild.

Nicole and Scott had married less than two years after Peter's death. He'd moved in and then they'd moved out after the wedding. Started married life out in their own flat not far from the sprawling house on Bannerman Road but by their first anniversary they had moved back in. Not because of money or space or a sense of duty but because they all hated being apart.

Luke, whose brilliant mind would have enabled him to walk into any University on the planet, chose the one that was a short bus ride away. The admissions panel had looked at his straight A transcripts, double checked their website and prospectus to ensure that the applied physics course had been listed with the correct points entry score, then welcomed him in with open arms.

Already he was changing the face of research and this little-known University was now seemingly creating and encouraging the new Einstein.

As for Nicole, she and her husband made the house seem less empty. He'd first moved in temporarily six months after the funeral to "help out" and then never really left. Sarah looked on him as another son, and he had even worked up the courage to ask Sarah for permission to marry her daughter before getting down on one knee to ask the girl himself.

Meanwhile, mother and daughter worked side by side or tag teamed and the world was living in blissful ignorance of what might have been. Recently though Sarah had felt the balance start to shift. No longer was she leading her daughter, after almost five years Nicole seemed to leading her. When Scott joined them she almost felt like a third wheel. Age was creeping up on her and while she was certainly not past it she really wasn't as young as she used to be.

(And the grandchild on the way seemed to confirm that.)

More than once she'd started to think about what would happen when the baby arrived and she knew that she would let Nicole take over completely. Stay at home Gran while Mum and Dad saved the world.

Not a bad little family she had on reflection. Quite wonderful and marvellous in fact.

At the 20 week scan Nicole had refused to find out the baby's sex, much to Scott's annoyance but Sarah understood why. She had looked at her daughter and known about the baby from the start, so she had also looked and known that if it were a boy then there would only be one name she wanted. Scott wouldn't protest, Sarah knew that. He understood what Nicole's father meant to her, what he had done for his family and so he would be proud to call his son Peter, to pass on the legacy of the Dalton family.

But Nicole was scared. What if it wasn't a boy? She wanted a son, she wanted something for and from her father. She wanted that legacy and she was prepared to hang onto five more months of uncertainty if the outcome was going to be disappointment. (Not that Nic would ever be disappointed with her child's sex. But Sarah understood. When she'd been pregnant with Nic part of her had hoped for a boy to have that obvious link to Peter.)

They'd begun work on the nursery, all of them helping to empty out the spare room and paint it. Unable to decide on colours they'd all picked one and painted a different wall each. The intention had been that they would choose one and repaint the other three to match but the outcome had been strangely appealing. Four different colours that blended well together and Nic had fiercely declared that they were leaving it as it was.

Scott and Luke had rolled their eyes and muttered something about pregnancy hormones. Sarah had laughed to herself and silently corrected them on it being the Smith temper and stubbornness.

Scott was already demanding his wife take things easy, something Nic only did when she wanted to. But then that had been slipped into their vows: "I promise to love, honour, and let you think I'll obey you for the rest of my days."

The wedding had been simple and beautiful. Totally them. Nic had quipped about wearing her jeans so much that Scott had actually believed that she was going to turn up in them. Instead she'd had her mother's wedding dress altered; the layers were still there but they were trimmed with black velvet, it had been shortened (Nic never liked full length) so she showed off the strapped sandals she'd worn. The sleeves had been split from the wrist to the shoulder and when she'd walked into the church Scott had nearly fallen over at how beautiful she looked.

Sarah had given her daughter away but both of them had missed Peter. He'd have been so proud of her that day.

Her feet stopped walking and allowed her mind to return to reality.

"Hi," she said gently, looking at the black marble slab in front of her.

* * *

Her fortnightly ritual complete she turned to leave. This was her time with Peter, just talking to him about things that were going on and for the last eight years she'd done just that. Every two weeks, plus birthdays, anniversaries and the odd time that she had one of those days. Keeping him up to date with news of the kids, their friends and passing aliens. Nic and Scott, Luke and his "we're not serious, honest" girlfriend. Rani was engaged and even Clyde was showing signs of settling down.

Life had moved on but she felt like she had to keep Peter in the loop, even now. She had to tell him everything because she didn't want to keep anything from him again. There were no more secrets, even in death. If it was considered weird or creepy then no one ever said anything. Apparently the label of 'widow' allowed her some eccentricities not previously covered.

Making her way back to the path she caught sight of a young man, flowers in hand. There was something about him that seemed off, but Sarah knew better than that. Her feet hit the gravel of the path and she turned to face him, saying nothing and not moving.

He said nothing either, no flicker of anything, just kept walking with the flowers dropped to his side. Sarah kept looking at him, waiting for him to reach her, before wrapping her arms around him. He returned the favour and held her as she listened to the thud-thud, thud-thud of those double hearts.

* * *

"Thought you were going to hit me," he said as they sat on a bench, "given last time..."

"When _was_ the last time for you?" she asked.

"When you kicked me out of your house," he confirmed. "Things are pretty much in order now, I promise. Unless you've seen me since then?"

"So why have you come?" she asked.

"What? Nothing about the new face?" he joked. "What do you think?"

"I think it's unfair that you get younger with each regeneration. And what is with the bow tie?"

"Everyone picks on the bow tie! Bow ties are cool."

"Since when?" she laughed, leaning over and putting her head on his shoulder. "Nic's pregnant."

"Congratulations."

"I'm not old enough to be a gran."

"I take it Scott...?"

"They're married now."

"Son-in-law and a grandchild?"

"Yeah. So what's new with you? Apart from the face."

"Too much to tell you now," he said, putting his arm around her.

"I'm glad you came," she said quietly.

"I know what today is."

"I couldn't tell the kids. I almost don't want them to know. Is that selfish of me?"

"No," he assured her. "Today was yours. You and Peter."

"Meeting him in that bar..."

"I remember."

"I'm sorry."

"For what?" he asked.

"For... I was angry at you, I was hurting, but to tell you to go? I'm sorry."

"I understood why."

"I've missed you."

He couldn't help but smile. "I've missed you too."

"Who's travelling with you this time?"

"Girl called Amy."

"What's she like?"

"Brilliant. Fantastic. Amazing. Scottish," he said.

"You two should come over tonight. I know the kids would love to see you."

"Not sure I could cope with Nic having another go at me," he laughed.

"She's calmed down a lot."

"Now that I have to see to believe."

"So come over," she asked again, sitting up as her phone started to ring. "Hey love," she answered. After a pause she finished, "OK, yeah, I'm on my way."

"Back to the day job then?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"You take care, Sarah Jane," the Doctor said suddenly and earnestly.

"Always do," she smiled. "I have a family to protect."

"I had to come," he continued. "Today I mean. You and I... There's too much between us to let it slide. Too much history. And today, the day you met him... I could have stopped you but I didn't even though I knew how it would end. I never wanted you to get hurt but I knew that this life, the one you have lived, was the one you wanted and you'd have chosen it. Even if you had known the cost from the start."

"Well thank you," she smiled as she got to her feet. "I don't know... It wouldn't have been right not to make peace at some point."

"Indeed."

"I should go," she said, waving her mobile phone. "Two bounty hunters are moving in on our patch. Nic's worried about collateral damage. Too many guns."

"Go on then," he said quietly.

"So, you and Amy are coming over for dinner tonight?"

"Sure," he smiled sadly. "We'd love to."


	5. Love, Actually

Dating : this follows on from the wedding (Chapter 8 - .net/s/5723306/8/Second_Chance)

* * *

_As soon as I got the pictures back I knew I had gold. Absolute gold. She looked so amazing but then how could she not? Her whole face was alight with joy and love and that was before we get onto what she was wearing. The old girl looked stunning in the dress, everyone said so._

_ I thought she looked beautiful. Absolutely, jaw on the floor beautiful. The minute she walked into that church I thought my heart was going to burst out of my chest. _

_ This is pathetic. This is really pathetic. I am the embodiment of the biggest walking cliché going. I'd like to be able to say that that it came out of nowhere, or that I tried so hard to fight it but I'd be lying. I let this happen. I am completely in love with an amazing woman who is completely in love with someone else. Completely in love and married to someone else._

_ I am, apparently, pathetic._

_

* * *

_  
They had started with the master bedroom, wanting to make their marital home and their marital space _theirs_. The paper had been stripped away and the walls sanded. Neither of them were brave enough to tackle the joys of paste and lumps and bumps so they'd opted for the safe option of paint. With a feature wall. (Lavina's idea, not theirs, but after the samples were painted on they had to agree she had a point. Then came the arguments about what colour the feature wall should be.)

Somehow the undercoat had been splashed and somehow it had gone all down Peter's leg and somehow he had dropped his roller and somehow the paint had run all down Sarah's arm and somehow they had started to wrestle and throw paint around, ending up on their covered bed halfway between wrestling and foreplay.

Well, maybe more than halfway.

The doorbell chimed and Peter swore. At least it sounded like a swear word – his head was buried in her neck at the time.

"Ignore them," Sarah muttered, pushing him over and sitting astride his stomach.

"Planning to," he replied, his hands running up her legs.

The bell chimed again and this time it was Sarah who swore. "Harry," she muttered.

"Sarah, love," Peter sighed, "if you've forgotten my name already..."

"No, it'll be Harry," she said, getting to her feet. "He called earlier, said he wanted to come over."

"We can still ignore him," he pleaded, grabbing her hand and trying to pull her back to bed. "Pretend we've gone out, that your aunt has whisked us off to one of her functions. Or that you had to work. Or anything!"

"It'll keep," she smiled, holding his face in her hands and kissing him gently. "And you know it's worth the wait."

He sighed again as she left the room, laying back down on the bed to think of cold showers.

"Lose a fight with a tin of paint, old girl?" Harry joked as Sarah finally answered the door.

"Not as much as Peter lost," she replied, kissing him gently on the cheek as he stepped inside.

"Where is he?"

"Upstairs, getting changed," she covered.

"I come bearing gifts," Harry said, holding up the wallet.

"Photos?" Sarah asked, slightly confused until she remembered. "The wedding?"

"Why else would I be calling 'round at this hour?"

"I'll put the kettle on."

"Music to my ears."

* * *

He knew when she'd seen it. Her whole body changed. They had both looked through his pictures of that day, before the ceremony, during and after, talking about the guests or the location or their memories. Then they came to that picture. The one he wasn't sure if he could put in there or not.

But then they could have asked for the negatives to make their own copies, and what was he going to do? Cut that one out of the strip? Claim he'd lost them?

Peter was distracted for a moment by the one Sarah had just discarded but then the two of them were looking at this off-guard moment.

And Harry felt his heart break all over again, just like it had when he'd heard those words : _I now pronounce you husband and wife_.

"I should go," he said quickly, putting his cup down. "I've taken up enough of your night, and you can look through those at your leisure."

"They're beautiful," Sarah said quietly. "Harry..."

"Keep them. The negatives are in there too."

"You kept copies though?" Peter asked.

Harry didn't respond.

"We can't..." Sarah began, but she stopped when Harry got to his feet. "Thank you," she said, recognising his mood. "Dinner soon, yeah? You and me?"

"That'd be nice," he said with warmth and enthusiasm.

Peter said nothing. He watched his wife show her friend out, then he looked back at the photos. When she returned he handed her the one taken during the speeches and looked at her.

"Oh," was all she said.

* * *

Harry stopped and turned as he heard Sarah calling his name. She was running down the street towards him and so he stopped and waited.

"Here," she said, holding out the photos.

"Sarah..."

"I'm sorry," was all she could say.

"Not your fault."

"Yeah, but... I'm still sorry."

He took the pictures back from her, looking at them for a moment. He lifted the flap and quickly pulled out one, handing it back to her before slipping the rest of them into his jacket pocket.

"I don't want to lose you," she said quickly, glancing at the photo he'd given her.

"You won't," he assured her. "Just... I'll be fine. I will."

Sarah took a deep breath and nodded. Then she pushed up on her toes and pressed her lips to his, holding them there in a lingering kiss. "Goodnight, Harry."

"Goodnight, old girl."

* * *

"He's my oldest friend," Sarah told Peter sadly as she leant back against the front door. "We've been through so much together, seen and done... so much. And I never knew. I never saw it." She looked at the picture in her hand, a stolen moment during the speeches.

"You weren't looking for it," he replied.

"I should have seen it, I should have known."

Could things be that different this time around? Or had he loved her before? Only before he'd not had to watch her marry someone else, love someone else, make a home with someone else. All those long nights working together, staying up late, getting up early. All that time they spent together and not once...

"You OK?" Peter asked, walking over to her. He took the photo from her and smiled. "It's a beautiful picture."

"I'll be fine," she said quietly. "Really." She fixed her eyes on his. "I love you."

"I know," he said.

She let him pull her into a hug, resting her head against his chest. She felt his lips press against her hair and smiled. "That's nice," she muttered, listening to the thud-thud of his heart.

"What? This?" he asked, kissing the top of her head again.

"Yeah."

"Yeah, it is nice, isn't it?" he agreed, nuzzling her hair. He knew why she ran after Harry and he suspected what had happened. But he didn't need to ask, he didn't need to know. He loved and trusted her and that was enough. That was what love actually meant.


	6. Complications

References : chapters 11 & 13, along with blink-and-you'll-miss-them allusions to chapters 14, 15 & 44.

"And being a mum? It's just about as complicated as it gets." _Sarah Jane Smith, "Mona Lisa's Revenge"._

* * *

**1. 1988**

She felt a million things all at once and yet it was also like she couldn't feel anything at all. It was like she'd run off the edge of that cliff and her legs were pedalling in mid-air.

Then with one sharp cry she fell.

"It's a girl!" the midwife declared, holding up the red and sticky and screaming child in her hands for mum to see. The baby's face was screwed up and her tiny voice seemed to be deafening.

In the seconds that followed Sarah became aware of a further change in her body; every part of her was screaming too : _give me my child_. She wanted to hold her and soothe her and calm her.

"Here you go, mum."

The baby was wrapped and placed on Sarah's chest and immediately Sarah began to cry. Her daughter was real, a tangible weight in her arms. She was alive and well, screaming and protesting at being pulled into the world.

"Hey there you," Sarah whispered, running a finger down her newborn daughter's cheek. "Welcome to the world."

It wasn't immediate, but the baby quietened at the sound of the familiar voice. As Sarah continued to soothe and talk to her daughter the cries softened and died away. After cutting the cord Peter moved to the top of the bed, wrapping himself around the pair of them as best he could.

"We need to get her weighed and cleaned up," the midwife said "I'll have her back as soon as I can and then you don't have to let her go ever again if you don't want to!"

"I'll let Lavinia know," Peter said, kissing the top of his wife's head. "Make a few calls."

"Let me tell Harry, yeah?" Sarah said.

"Of course," he smiled. He kissed her again, holding his lips there for a fraction longer than before. "Thank you," he whispered.

"Thank you," she replied before he left the room.

* * *

**2. 1989**

As soon as Nicole was mobile Sarah felt like she was constantly playing catch up. Felt like every thirty seconds Nicole had moved to grab something in reach or pull things off tables. Her father's paperwork, her mother's work, and Sarah had to stop bringing work home from UNIT after Nicole made a grab for what turned out to be an alien blaster and destroyed a table.

Not long before Nicole's first birthday Sarah was working from home, going through the obligatory paperwork that always seemed to build up because you were always doing something else like trying to save the world. Nicole was sat on her play rug in the middle of the floor, nothing around her but toys and games and books. In the thirty seconds in which Sarah was looking for her notebook Nicole moved.

Unable to see her daughter in her peripheral vision when she found the notebook Sarah stopped dead. A quick search revealed that she wasn't anywhere in the room which only served to heighten the confusion and panic. She was quick on all fours but not that quick.

Getting to her feet, Sarah dashed out into the hallway. "Nicole?" she called, trying not to sound panicked or worried.

A soft giggle from the front porch gained her attention and she turned to see Nicole, her hands pressed against the front door for support as if she were reaching up for the door handle. She turned and grinned at her mother (her single white tooth jutting from her top gum) and waved.

"And where are we going?" Sarah joked, the relief washing over her.

Nicole pointed a hand at her wellies.

"Bit cold for the park, love," Sarah said, walking over to her with the intention of picking her up.

Nicole met her halfway.

As soon as she saw her daughter waddling on her unsteady feet, Sarah stopped dead for the second time in as many minutes.

Nicole stumbled against her leg, clinging to her mother's shin, and grinned up at her as if to say, 'So who's the clever one then?'

Picking Nicole up, Sarah held her close and kissed her chubby face. "I saw galaxies and supernovas," she whispered to the child, "too many races to count and so many wondrous sights. I travelled among the stars and had adventures that you and your father wouldn't believe. My best friend was a man with two hearts and different faces. Aliens of all colours, shapes and sizes. Some like us and some so, so different. Machines and creatures and things that even now I wonder if I've made them up.

"But you? You, my little one, are much, much more amazing than any of that could ever be."  
Nicole grinned and put her hand on Sarah's mouth.

She kissed it and smiled. "Don't tell your dad about the man with two hearts," she whispered almost conspiratorially and couldn't help but laugh when Nicole seemed to nod in agreement.

* * *

**3. 1993**

"Well? What do you think?"

Sarah had been stood with the camera, primed and ready to take the picture, but seeing her little girl, holding on to her father's hand for dear life made her stop and take a deep breath.

"I think she looks very grown up," Peter continued.

"I do too," she finally said, lifting the camera and taking the picture. "What do you think?"

"Don't like the skirt," Nicole sulked, pulling at it.

"Girls wear skirts," Sarah reminded her gently.

"Don't want to be a girl then."

The simplicity of her argument made them both smile and Peter swooped down to pick her up, dropping her on the edge of the table. "There is nothing wrong about being a girl," he said. "The Queen of this country is a girl."

"Being queen is boring," Nicole declared.

"We had a female Prime Minister..."

Nicole stared at him blankly.

"...and that's probably not the best example," he decided. "That character from that TV show you like is a girl."

"She's not real."

Peter threw an exasperated look at Sarah. "Little help here?"

"I'm a girl," Sarah said. "Am I boring?"

Nicole shook her head.

"Aunt Liz is a girl. Great Aunt Lavinia is a girl."

"They don't wear skirts," Nicole replied.

"They do sometimes. When they have to."

"Do I have to?"

Sarah nodded. "It's your uniform."

"The boys don't have to wear them."

"They have to wear something else."

"Why can't I wear what they do?"

"Can boys wear skirts?" Sarah asked.

"That's silly," Nicole laughed.

"So you get to wear something they can't. That makes you special."

"I'm special?" Nicole asked.

"More than you'll ever know," Sarah replied, kissing the top of her daughter's head. "And you look beautiful in that skirt."

Nicole swung her legs a little, seemingly considering this argument. "OK," she decided. "Do I have to always wear it?"

"You can wear whatever you want when you come home," Sarah said, and instantly regretted it knowing what would most likely come next.

"Dungarees!" Nicole laughed as Peter lifted her back to the ground. "Pandy dungarees!"

Peter laughed too, but at his wife's expression. When they'd moved into this house he'd found an old pair of striped dungarees that she wouldn't explain where she got them from. When Nicole had found them she'd fallen in love and sulked and cried and thrown tantrums until she had a pair of her own.

Lavinia had taken one look at her darling grand-niece in them and spent the afternoon calling her Andy Pandy, much to Nicole's amusement, Peter's bemusement, and Sarah's annoyance.

"You know she'll hate you if you throw them out," Peter said as he kissed Sarah on the cheek.

"I'm willing to risk it," she sighed.

"Come on," he laughed softly. "Let's go do the parents-at-the-gate thing."

* * *

**4. 1994**

When Nicole brought the letter home from school she knew what it said before opening the envelope. Claire was Nicole's best friend and therefore, as always seemed to be the case, Hannah had been a good friend of Sarah's. She'd suffered badly with cysts and fibroids and so the decision had been made to perform a hysterectomy. Hannah and Chris had their family, it seemed like the logical choice.

There would have to be a post-mortem of course but they suspected that it was as a result of the surgery. A clot or infection.

Her friend's death had hit her hard; knowing what was going to happen in the future meant that she could prepare for it, plan for it, change what she could and make sure that what she couldn't didn't affect those she loved more than anything else in this world.

But this she hadn't known. She hadn't known Hannah and Chris, Claire and Neil before. Their paths had never crossed.

_Dear parent,_

_Everyone at the school have been saddened to learn of the death of Hannah Phillips, mother of one of our Y1 students. We are aware that Claire is a popular girl and therefore many of our students will be affected by this tragedy._

_This may be the first experience of death for many of our children and therefore we are offering any family who may be affected by this the chance to come and speak to..._

She stopped reading the letter and glanced down at Nicole. "Did your teacher tell you what this was for?"

Nicole shook her head.

"Was Claire in school today?"

"Think she's sick," Nicole shrugged. "Can I go play?"

Sarah nodded, her heart sinking as she watched her daughter skip out of the kitchen.

* * *

After dinner Sarah lifted Nicole into her lap and gently stroked her hair. "I need to talk to you about something," she began, glancing nervously at Peter who was standing by the sink, ready to jump in for support.

"Am I in trouble?" Nicole asked.

"No, it's nothing like that. It's about Claire. You know her mummy was sick?"

Nicole nodded. "She went to hospital and the doctors made her better."

"The doctors thought they had made her better, but she was still sick."

"Does she have to go back?"

"No, sweetheart," Sarah said gently. "She... Claire's mummy died."

Nicole thought about this for a second.

"You remember Mr Thomas who used to live down the street, the one with the dog?"

"Goldie," Nicole said proudly. Then her face fell. "She got sick too."

"She got sick and then she died, remember? We helped him to plant some flowers in his garden to remember Goldie by?"

Nicole nodded silently.

"Well, Claire's mummy got sick and she died too. That's why Claire wasn't in school today. She won't be back in school for a while."

"Why not?"

"Well, she's very sad at the moment. She's not going to see her mummy again."

"Ever?"

Sarah shook her head sadly. "Do you have anything you want to ask me?"

"Where has she gone?"

"Well," Peter interjected, "some people think that when you die you go to a place called heaven. It's a fantastic place, really beautiful, and you really like it there."

"And that's where Claire's mummy has gone?"

"Yeah," Peter said.

He caught Sarah's eye and she understood why. Neither of them were very religious, their church wedding and Nicole's christening had been more to appease Lavinia than anything else. But some things a six year old girl needed to believe in. At the top of that list, nudging ahead of Santa and the Tooth Fairy, was that dead people went to a nice place called heaven.

"Why don't you make Claire a card so she knows you're thinking about her? We can take it over." Nicole nodded and slipped off her mother's knee. When she'd gone Sarah turned to Peter. "Think she really understood?"

"Have to wait and see," he replied.

* * *

Nicole's screaming wrenched Sarah from sleep and before she really had time to register what was going on she had thrown back the covers and was out of bed, racing towards her daughter's room.

"Nic?" Sarah asked, spotting her sitting upright in bed, tears streaming down her face. "What's the matter?"

Nicole held out her arms and let Sarah gather her into a hug. She sobbed against her mother's chest while Sarah ran her hand down her hair. When the tears finally stopped Sarah didn't move, waiting for Nicole to say something.

"I don't want you to go to heaven," she said eventually, her little body starting to shake with hiccups.

"What?"

"I don't want you to die."

Sarah pulled back a little so she could hold Nicole's face in her hands. "Is that what you were dreaming about?"

Nicole nodded.

"Oh sweetheart..." She pulled Nicole back into a hug, shooting a look over at Peter who had been two steps behind her and now waited in the doorway. "Claire's mummy was sick."

"You get sick."

"It's... different. Sometimes the doctors can make you better but sometimes they can't. People die for lots of reasons. Sometimes you have an accident, but sometimes you just get old."

"Aunt Lavinia is old," Nicole said, her face falling and tears threatening to fall again.

"Yeah, but not as old as Mrs Fields," Peter pointed out. "And she's still alive and well, isn't she?"

Reminded of their elderly neighbour, Nicole was placated.

"Want me to stay with you?" Sarah offered. When she nodded Sarah curled in behind her small body, pulling the covers over both of them. "I'm here," she soothed gently, "and I plan on being around for a long, long time, little one. Me and your dad."

Nicole pushed back against Sarah's body, her hand clasped with Sarah's over her stomach as if clinging to her mother would keep her here and keep her safe.

* * *

**5. 1996**

When her eight year old daughter complained of stomach pains on a Sunday night, Sarah was like millions of other parents who smiled, nodded, and told her that she'd be better in the morning. When she went to school.

Unlike millions of other parents (roughly speaking) she was wrong.

In the middle of the night Nicole shuffled into their room, choosing her father's side and gently shaking him until he was awake.

"Daddy, I feel sick," she said. And then she was.

* * *

The diagnosis was swift and before they even had time to think about it their daughter was whisked into surgery.

And the only thought on Sarah's mind, the only thing that kept going round and round like some twisted fairground ride, was the caveat on the anaesthetic. That one in a stupid amount reacted badly. Fatally badly.

One in a stupid amount.

The daughter who shouldn't exist with the mother who saw one in a stupid amount almost on a daily basis a lifetime ago.

This was the night she would lose her.

* * *

"Sit down."

Peter's command was tired but also forceful. He was fed up of watching her get up, sit down, flick through magazines, study posters, offer to get some coffee, get it anyway and then just ignore it...

"How much longer do you think...?"

"Enough!" he snapped, shocking her slightly. "I can't just sit here and listen to you..."

"I just..."

"And I don't?" he finished. "That's my daughter in there too. And she'll be fine."

"What if she's not?"

"Sarah, it's her appendix. I had mine out when I was younger and I dare say medicine has improved a fair bit since then."

"They said a one in..."

When she faltered he shook his head. "You don't even remember the number it's that big."

"It's still a chance."

"Think it's up there with the possibility of life on other planets," Peter sighed which didn't make Sarah feel any better.

"It's still a chance," she repeated. "Any chance is too big." She turned away from him, wrapping her arms protectively around her stomach. "I'm going to lose her," she said quietly.

"You're not," Peter's voice whispered behind her, his arms slipping over hers.

"I can feel it..."

"Listen to me," he said, turning her in his arms. "I don't know why you're so hung up on this tiny chance, but this is how things are. If, and I do stress the word if, she was going to react to the anaesthetic then they would have known about it by now. And if that was the case, again with the word if, then they would have dealt with it and told us by now.

"But they haven't come out and told us anything. At all. Which means they are busy doing what they are supposed to be doing. I know it goes against every journalist fibre in your body but no news is good news, love."

Rationally she knew he was right. If things had gone wrong then they would know. She would feel it.

"Mr and Mrs Dalton?"

The noise startled them both, but the smile and nod on the nurse's face was enough.

Sometimes the improbable didn't happen.

* * *

**6. 2002**

"I did not go through all that just to have you kill yourself!" Sarah yelled, throwing down the packet.

"You went through my stuff?" Nicole challenged.

"Check your pockets before you put stuff out for the wash," she replied. "How long have you been smoking?"

"They're not mine..."

"Oh don't even try that one, Nicole Grace. You are fourteen years old..."

"As you take great delight in reminding me every time I want to do something or go somewhere," she snapped back. "I want to go away with some friends but I can't because I'm only fourteen. I want to go out with a guy my own age but I can't because I'm only fourteen. I want to try something new, something different, but I can't because I'm only fourteen. I'm only fourteen so I can't go quad biking. I'm only fourteen so I can't go up into the City by myself. I'm only fourteen so I'm surprised you let me cross the road by myself!"

Sarah said nothing, her daughter's attack ringing in her ears.

"You know, all my friends are surprised it's you. I mean, you're so independent and you keep talking about all the stories you came across when you were not much older than me. You were _sixteen years old_ and you knew you wanted to be a journalist. You went out there and you did what you wanted to do and nothing Aunt Lavinia could say would stop you."

"I never did anything so stupid though," Sarah said. Headstrong, reckless maybe. But never stupid.

"You never had to get your mother's attention," Nicole snapped as tears flooded her eyes.

"What?"

"You have _no_ idea what I want, you're too busy trying to... to wrap me up in cotton wool! You can't stop me from having a life, Mum..."

"I need to protect you..."

"No, Mum," Nicole said, suddenly very calm, "you don't. You need to be my mum. You can't stop me getting hurt and you can't stop me from making mistakes."

Sarah looked at the young woman stood in front of her as if she were seeing her for the first time. "Oh my god," she breathed.

"What?" Nicole asked.

"You."

"What about me?"

"You're... me."

"What?"

"You are exactly like me."

"Oh god," Nicole sighed, rolling her eyes in despair. "Mum..."

"I knew what I wanted and nothing was going to stop me." She held up the offending packet of cigarettes. "And because you're me I know two things. One, you don't do subtle. And two, if you had taken up smoking you wouldn't be smoking this cheap brand."

"It's my life, Mum."

"Yes. It is."

"But you're still going to be protective of me, right?"

"Sorry, love. That bit's hardwired."

Nicole thought about it for a bit. "I suppose I can live with that."

"In return for?" Sarah asked, knowing her daughter – knowing herself – far too well.

"I'm going out on Saturday. His name's Matt. He's in my year at school, mum's a teacher, dad does something in the City. We're going to the cinema, nothing above a twelve rating, then for pizza. I'll be home by nine and that's all you're getting. Understood?"

"Clearly," she smiled as Nicole walked past her, heading upstairs to her room – presumably to let Matt know their date was on.

Peter passed his daughter in the hallway, glancing over his shoulder at her in bemusement. The look faded when he walked into the kitchen to find his wife standing with a packet of cigarettes in her hand.

"Don't ask," she said, pressing her foot against the pedal of the bin and throwing the offending packet away.

* * *

**7. 2004**

"Have fun," Sarah called as Nicole picked up her bag.

"Who is it you're meeting?" Peter asked.

"Someone from school."

"Which someone?" Peter asked, his tone of voice stopping his daughter in her tracks. "Nicole?"

"Have fun," Sarah intervened, putting her hand on Peter's arm. "Are you going to be back for dinner?"

"Dunno, I'll text you," Nicole replied. "See ya."

Peter took his wife's hand and pulled her around to face him. "Sarah..."

"What?" she asked, feigning ignorance.

"You know what."

"Yes. And you know why I stopped you."

"I just want to know who she's seeing. Is that too much to ask? To know where my daughter is and who she's with?"

"We need to trust her."

"She's keeping things from us!"

"Trust me," she said, kissing him gently. "More flies with honey."

* * *

She put the book down when she heard the key turn in the lock. Nicole was taking care not to make any noise and nearly jumped out of her skin when her mother appeared in the living room door.

"God, Mum. You gave me a heart attack."

"Good night?"

"Yeah, very. Why are you still up?"

"Couldn't put my book down."

"You're a shocking liar, Mum."

Sarah didn't rise to it. "Believe what you want. Want a drink?"

"Please," she smiled, following her mother into the kitchen. "Go on then."

"What?"

"The third degree."

"About what?"

"Oh I can't deal with this," Nicole said, sinking onto a chair by the table. "At least Dad would be yelling at me now, demanding to know his name."

"There's a name?" Sarah asked, taking the seat across from her daughter and pushing the cup of tea over.

"Yeah, he..." she began, then caught Sarah's eye. "Oh you're good," she laughed.

"So I've been told." Sarah lifted her mug to her lips and blew on the hot liquid.

"When did you know? That Dad was the one?"

The question threw Sarah for a second and she tried to think of what her answer should be.

"Dad said he knew from the start, from that moment in the bar."

"Yeah, it wasn't that quick for me," Sarah decided on. "But I knew, quickly enough, that he was something special."

"It's stupid. He was in my class for years, but when he moved... I missed him. Like, really missed him. Piece of me missing missed him, you know?"

The pain of watching Peter fade away flashed in her chest for a moment and she forced herself to focus on her daughter. "You look happy."

"I am," Nicole grinned. "Really happy. Not like my favourite show's on happy, or winning the sports day happy. This is..."

"More," Sarah finished. "But the kind of more you can't put into words. We put the word happy on so much that when it comes and knocks us over we don't know what to call it."

"Are you about to launch into the story of the flame haired Scot again?" Nicole laughed.

"Are you being careful?" Sarah asked suddenly.

"I... we..." Nicole stammered, and glanced away.

"You're sixteen years old. There's no rush."

"Yeah, we know. But..." Nicole took a deep breath. "I can't believe I'm talking to you about this."

"You can talk to me about anything, sweetheart."

"Like to see Dad's face if I tried to talk to him about it. If I asked him..."

"Asked him what?" Sarah prompted.

"I... have an appointment. With the doctors. Tomorrow." Nicole caught Sarah's eye and quickly added, "For the whole 'being careful' thing?"

"Right. Yes. Of course." She'd just found her feet being mum to a teenage boy when everything had changed. In a few years' time she'd be that mum again, but now she was faced with being a mum to a teenage girl.

"If you don't want to come..." Nicole stammered, feeling very self-conscious.

"No, no," Sarah said quickly, her hand reaching out across the table to grab her daughter's. "I'll be there. I'm always going to be here."

"Don't get all Hallmark on me now," Nic deflected.

"You're my daughter, my beautiful little girl. I will go anywhere for you, do anything for you."

"Even this?"

"Little one, I would tear apart the Universe for you. No one on this planet, in this whole existence, is more important to me than you."

"Please don't tell Dad. I don't think I could cope knowing... I mean, it's bad enough I'm telling you!"

"I think it's better for him to keep it between us!" Sarah laughed. "One thing, love," she said as Nicole got up. "His name? Just so I can give your dad _something_."

Nicole smiled. "John."

"John?"

"Yup. John Smith."

Sarah froze in a state of disbelief. She knew, realistically, that it wouldn't be him. But the name still meant something. The first man she loved, the first man her daughter loved. There was something nice and poetic about that.

* * *

**8. 2006**

They stood at the end of their driveway, looking down the road long after Nicole's car had turned the corner and disappeared from sight. Peter stood behind his wife, his arms wrapped around her waist, whispering in her ear that it was only University, that she would be home at weekends, for holidays, and any time she just wanted to come back. Their daughter's bedroom would always be their daughter's bedroom, and they would always be her parents.

"We tell ourselves that we would do anything for those we love," he said quietly, "but we forget that sometimes what we need to do is... let go."

"It's not easy," she said, putting her hands over his. "Sometimes you can't let go."

Peter moved a hand and placed it gently on her chest. "Can't let go in here. No matter what happens out there."

"I love you," she said.

"I love you too. Even if your life was weird and wonderful before I met you!"

She smiled, turning in his arms to face him. "All that time in the TARDIS, the things I saw, the things I did? You and Nicole are the best things that have ever happened to me."

"So not tempted to run off with him then? The Doctor?"

"That was a lifetime ago. This is my life now. With you."

"And the robot dog, a couple of lipsticks that you won't find in the Avon catalogue, and I don't even know what that watch can do!"

"You OK with all this?"

"I..." he began, stopping when a Post Office van pulled up. He watched Sarah sign for the parcel. "What's that?"

She knew it held the Xylok crystal but still shrugged. "Been sent from Indonesia."

"Come on then," he smiled. "Somehow I don't think it's something you want to open in front of the neighbours."

"Welcome to our life, Mr Dalton," she smiled as they started back up the driveway.


	7. Final Heartbeat

It didn't feel like a heart attack but she knew that was what it would look like. When this was over, when they investigated, that would be their conclusion.

So this was it then.

* * *

They'd separated, the old 'divide and conquer' tactic. Scott was with Nic – he was almost surgically attached to his wife's side every time she went out these days – and Sarah had thought nothing of going after one of the bounty hunters herself. For a moment she'd been getting somewhere with him, convincing him that his bounty wasn't on Earth, that he should be looking elsewhere. Then he had seen Nic and Scott talking to his competition and he has assumed that she was making a deal to protect the man – his assumed target.

When he'd taken aim at her daughter Sarah's response had been automatic and immediate. At first she'd not felt anything, just watched as he'd taken off after his competition. She'd stayed on her feet long enough to see that Scott had pulled Nic to safety. Knowing she was safe, that she was protected, was all she needed and then it hit her. The wall of pain, the disappearing strength, and the impact of the ground as she crashed to it.

* * *

"Sarah?"

His voice was soft, the new cadence already ingrained in her mind and she forced her eyes open.

"Hey there," he smiled gently at her. "Had me worried for a moment."

"Doctor," she whispered. "I..."

"It's OK," he soothed, helping her to a sitting position against the crates. "It'll be OK."

"Nic..."

"She's fine. She's safe. They've gone, she and Scott are looking for you."

"I..." she began, then she finally caught his gaze. And she knew.

"It'll be OK," he repeated. "I promise."

"I'm supposed to protect her," Sarah whispered. "The Universe..."

"It's been twenty nine years," he told her gently. "Twenty nine years to the day since you decided to keep her. Today, Sarah. It's today. Twenty nine years with Peter, twenty nine years with Nicole." He noticed the flash of panic in her eyes and shook his head gently. "You and Nicole. You're the same, Sarah. She is you and you are her."

"So... me... for her?"

The Doctor nodded.

Sarah pressed her lips together and nodded slightly. "Then I'm OK with this."

"Oh Sarah..." he breathed, reaching out with one hand to cup her jaw.

"Really. I'm OK. If she's safe..."

"Oh she's more than safe, Sarah," he smiled, reaching into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a photo which he pressed into her hands.

Every cell in her body seemed like it was on fire but Nic and Scott were here, looking for her, and she was not giving up on them just yet. She glanced down at the photo he had given to her and suddenly the pain seemed to be on pause. Not gone, but not intensifying as it had been.

"It's a boy," she breathed, looking at the eldest child. Her fingertips ran down her grandson's face before moving to the two young girls stood with their parents.

"They're amazing," he assured her. "They're brilliant and amazing and fantastic and you would be so, so proud of them."

"She's OK?"

"She's OK."

Sarah nodded and the pause button was lifted; the pain spread further and deeper. It was getting harder to breathe now and it felt like her heart was struggling for every beat.

"You knew," she whispered, looking into those new and familiar eyes. "That's why you came today. You knew."

"I couldn't just leave it."

"I'm glad." Summoning as much strength as she could she lifted a hand to his face. "I loved you, you know that? All that time, all those adventures... And you broke my heart."

"I had to."

"I know, I know." She hissed slightly as the pain got the better of her, but composed herself quickly. "But thank you. For everything. Peter, Nicole..."

"The pleasure was all mine," he said. "You deserved this life, Sarah, you deserved to be happy."

"I was. I am."

"Even now?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"This means she's safe?"

He nodded.

"Then even now."

"I'm so, so sorry."

"Don't be."

He smiled gently then glanced away. "They'll be here soon."

"Go on, it's OK," she said.

"It was an honour to know you, Sarah Jane. An absolute honour."

"You too," she smiled.

He hesitated for a moment before leaning forward and pressing his lips against hers in a gentle kiss goodbye. Then he was gone.

"MUM!"

The scream cut through the pain and Sarah forced her eyes open to see Nic running towards her. Her daughter crashed to her knees in front of her.

"It'll be OK, Mum, we'll get help..."

"No, no, no..." Sarah said quickly. "Sweetheart..."

"SCOTT!" Nic yelled. "Scott!"

"Listen to me, listen..."

"No," Nic said defiantly. "No, I'm not letting you."

"Nicole Grace!" Sarah snapped, drawing on her remaining strength.

"Please, Mum..."

"It's OK, little one, it's OK."

"How is this OK?" Nicole sobbed.

"The only regret I have is that I won't see this little one," Sarah said, moving a hand to brush against Nicole's baby bump. "But he'll be fine, I know it."

"Don't leave me, Mum. Please."

"I'm fine with this, love. Really. I know you've been worried but... don't be. This makes everything OK."

"What? It takes you instead of me?"

"You'll understand," Sarah told her. "When you hold your son, you'll know."

"My son?" she breathed.

Sarah smiled gently, pushing it onto her lips through the pain. "I love you. And Luke. Even fond of Scott."

"I love you." The tears were streaming down Nicole's face now and she reached out for her mother's hand. "I can't do this without you. Please..."

"One thing," Sarah said quietly, forcing her voice through a throat that didn't seem to want to co-operate, "if a man in a bow tie turns up... Be nice."

"What?" Nicole asked, looking up.

"Tell Luke I'm sorry and I love him," Sarah breathed. "I wish I could tell him myself, I wish..."

The pressure on her chest forced the last of the air from her lungs and suddenly she felt like she was drowning. Within seconds the dark patches that had been invading her peripheral vision pushed forward, blurring and then obscuring her daughter's face. The last thing she was aware of was a soft pressure on her hands as Nicole gripped on as hard as she could.

Then the darkness was absolute.

* * *

Scott followed the sound of his wife's anguish, fearful of what he would find. After checking that she and the baby were OK he pulled her away from Sarah's body, holding her tightly as the devastation crippled her. The pair of them sat on the hard ground, rocking gently as their grief subsided to a point where they felt they could move.

Nicole's hand unfurled, revealing the photo she had removed from her mother's hand. The two of them looked at the picture; Nicole, Scott, a boy and two young girls. Nicole's hand drifted to her swollen stomach and she rubbed her bump gently as she leant back into her husband's body.

From his vantage point nearby the Doctor slid to the ground, his own tears running silently down his face. A red headed Scottish girl came and sat next to him.

"I'm sorry," she said gently before resting her head on his shoulder.

Separated by metres, years and lifetimes, the four of them mourned the loss of someone better than they themselves could ever hope to be.


	8. Five Dreams

**Five dreams Peter was there for and one the Doctor was**

**1.**

She felt like she couldn't breathe, spinning in the void. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew this was just a dream, that it wasn't real. And she also knew she'd dreamt this before. Reaching out in the darkness she felt her hand close around another and she grabbed onto it for dear life.

"Sarah Jane..."

His voice was older, softer, and that name...

"Peter," she called back, holding on as tight as she could. "I've got you, don't let go."

"Sarah Jane..."

He called her that before. She was Sarah Jane before. That distinction was made before. Here, this time, she was just Sarah; she didn't want that distinction anymore. The Doctor had called her Sarah. His Sarah. That same intimacy was afforded to Peter, her Peter, the man who had proposed to her, whose ring was on her finger now. The ring she could feel even now in her sleep.

"Peter!" she called out, trying to get a better grip on the hand she could feel in the dark but not see.

"I'm here, Sarah Jane," he said. His old and gentle voice seemed to whisper in her ear and she reached out with her free hand, trying to find something else to hang onto. "I'm right here."

"Don't leave me," she said, her voice breaking. "Peter... Stay with me."

The hand in hers was pulled sharply as the dream continued as it had before but she clung on as hard as she could.

"It's OK," Peter's voice whispered. "It's OK."

"It's not OK," she sobbed. "Don't leave me!"

Then it was like she was falling. Not with Peter, not like she had been before, but she was falling away from him. The tugging on her hand wasn't him pulling away from her but him trying to keep her. He couldn't hold on and she slipped from his grasp, falling away into the darkness.

* * *

She woke screaming. The screams gave way to coughs as her chest objected to the rapid expelling of air and Sarah clutched her chest as she gasped for breath. It felt _real_. It had been so, so real. She'd not lost him, he'd lost her and that seemed to be worse.

"Sarah?"

Peter burst into the bedroom, turning on the light in panic. He'd fallen off the sofa when she'd started to scream and he'd almost tripped over the blankets in his haste to reach her.

"What is it?" he asked, climbing up onto the bed to kneel next to her. "Sarah?"

"Bad dream," she managed to say as she reached out to touch him, making sure he was real. Glancing down at her left hand she saw that the ring was still there. He'd put it on her finger that lunchtime. It was the 80s, she was here with Peter, she was living her life over again.

But for how long? Was the dream a sign that this was coming to an end? Would she be taken from him in this timeline like he was taken from her before?

"Must have been really bad," Peter whispered, moving so he was next to her. "Gave me one hell of a fright."

"Sorry," she muttered as he put his arm around her and pulled her against his body.

"Don't blame you," he breathed against her temple. "Haven't been sleeping well lately myself."

"You'll get this bug," she protested.

"Don't care," he said, shuffling about a bit so he could pull the covers up over them both. "Go back to sleep. I'm right here."

"Promise?" she said, letting her eyes drift shut.

"Always," he promised, kissing her temple and feeling her body relax as sleep took her once more.

* * *

**2.**

She didn't wake screaming but she sat up sharply enough to stir Peter.

"Sorry," she muttered, laying back down.

"Wasn't asleep anyway," he replied.

Sarah rolled over onto her side and looked at him. "I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours."

"I don't know if I'm remembering or if I'm just imagining it, but... My life, without you."

"What?"

"I keep dreaming about what my life would be like without you, without Nic or Luke..." He sighed gently, reaching out under the covers for her body. "What was yours?"

"Hmm?"

"Your dream. I told you mine..."

"You, on your own..."

"Liar," he said.

"I lost you," she said bluntly. "I lost you and..."

"I was fine though, yeah? You.. You were dead, Sarah."

She propped herself up on her elbow to look at him.

"Thirteen years old," he said quietly. "Bit younger than Luke."

"Or a bit older," she joked, "depending on how you look at it."

"Thirteen years old..."

"It didn't happen," she said gently, lowering her hand a little to be able to stroke his hair.

"Not to you. It's... To just change the past like that? How is that even possible?"

"Would you do it? If you could?"

"What? Change the past?" He thought about it for a moment then shrugged as best he could while he was lying down.

"If you lost me?" she asked bluntly. "Would you change the past then? To save me? Bring me back?"

"I hate theoretical discussions," he dodged, lifting his hand to hold hers. "Especially at stupid hours in the morning." But the way he was holding onto her gave away his answer.

"You were falling away from me," Sarah said, her fingers entwining with his. "It was dark so I couldn't see you, but I could feel you. I'd be holding one or both of your hands, and I would hear your voice, but it would be the same thing, over and over. I would be holding on so tight but you would be pulled away from me. Or I would be pulled away from you. And no matter how hard I tried...

"But all you ever said to me was 'it's OK', like it was normal, like it was supposed to happen. Like you were OK with it."

"For the record, I'm not OK with the idea of leaving you." He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. "This isn't the first time you've had that dream, is it?"

She shook her head gently.

"Why didn't you tell me about it before?"

"It was just a dream," she dismissed.

"If I believed in dreams I'd say that dreams represent something."

Sarah lay down, resting her head on his chest. She smiled as he began to stroke her hair and she felt herself finally begin to relax. "I just... don't want to lose you."

"You won't," he soothed.

She didn't dream of him being torn from her again.

* * *

**3.**

She'd had nightmares the first time around too. Those nightmares had centred around not being able to stop the Daleks, or not being able to escape the Reality Bomb. Or watching as Luke, Clyde and Maria dissolved into nothing.

This time her hands pounded on the glass as the Daleks rounded up Peter, Nicole, Luke, Clyde and Maria. Her screams were ignored as they turned to face her, seemingly taunting her as the Reality Bomb was activated and everyone she loved dissolved into nothing.

"Sarah."

Peter's voice was real and warm, full of concern, and it anchored her to pull her from her dream.

"Sarah," he repeated, over and over, until her eyes snapped open. "You were dreaming. Sarah, it's OK. It's OK."

The tears welled as she pushed up to a sitting position, letting Peter hold her.

He'd been expecting this. There was something in her, something in his beautiful wife, that couldn't deal with the things that she saw. He'd watched her suffer nightmares before and he'd just known that tonight would have been one of those nights. So he had stayed awake, watching her sleep. When her eyes had started to flicker he knew she was dreaming, and her soft whimpers and moans, her body thrashing under the torments of her nightmare. When he couldn't bear seeing her like this anymore he started to wake her.

Holding her tightly he made gentle, soothing noises as she cried on his shoulder. He couldn't stop her having bad dreams but he could be there for her when she woke from them.

* * *

**4.**

She jumped slightly as his arms wrapped around her waist but soon relaxed into his hold.

"You need to sleep," he whispered softly in her ear.

"I can't. And you're a fine one to talk."

"You should have woken me."

"You'd managed to get to sleep," she said gently, putting her hand over his. "Didn't want to disturb you."

"Don't feel like I got any, not any decent sleep at any rate. So. How many coffees have you had?" he asked, nodding towards the mug sat by the kettle.

She ignored the question. "I was thinking, I have contacts..."

"What? UNIT?" he asked.

"I was thinking... a little less Earth-bound contacts. A couple of trackers I met years ago arrived in our solar system yesterday. They're passing through but Mr Smith can send them a message."

"Trackers?"

"They're really good. The Doctor and I watched them track a creature across two solar systems, a creature smaller than a cat. If they can do that then they can find Nic..."

"Sarah," he said cautiously, his grip around her waist tightening slightly.

"The police aren't interested, Peter."

"She's not missing," Peter said gently. "Not to them."

"I don't care what they say, she's missing. I don't know where she is, I don't know what she's doing, if she's OK..."

"The police would have told us if they'd found her in a hospital somewhere."

"That was then. Anything could have happened to her since then."

The way she said that told Peter why she'd not been able to sleep. "Sarah..." he breathed against her neck.

"I can't help it. Every time I close my eyes I see her. In a gutter, a hospital bed... a morgue."

"Stop it." His voice was harsh and his grip on her relaxed to spin her around. "I don't want to hear you..."

"It _hurts_, Peter. Not knowing where she is... I can't help but think the worse."

"Do you really think our daughter is that kind of girl?" he challenged. "Sarah... Nicole is so like you it's scary. She's strong and determined and resourceful."

"I need her home," she whispered.

In the moonlight shining through the kitchen window he could see her eyes shining for a second until she closed them. "She'll be fine, love," he whispered, kissing her forehead and pulling her against his chest. "She's fine. She's out there, somewhere, and she's fine. I just... _know_. I feel it."

"Me too," Sarah said, "and I know you're right, but I can't help but think... I need her home, Peter. At the very least I need to speak to her."

She said nothing more as he held her, her guilt rushing through her mind along with her morbid thoughts. Because of her, because of all this, Mrs Wormwood...

"Have Mr Smith call them," Peter said eventually.

"They won't come cheap."

"This is Nicole we're talking about. Whatever it takes."

"I should have done something, said something..."

"Like what?" he asked. "Love, you couldn't have known."

When she started to cry he read it as grief, but held her through her quiet guilt anyway.

* * *

**5.**

When she woke in the morning she felt refreshed, relaxed and contented. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed, finding her slippers and pushing her feet inside. Walking over to the grand window she pulled the curtains back, looking out over the peaceful day that was rising over Bannerman Road. Her gaze dropped to the driveway and she saw her little green car, sat by itself in front of the house.

Curious she put her hands to the glass, leaning forward to try and get a better view. When there was no expected clink of metal on glass she looked – no rings. Turning on her heel she scanned the room. Her things but none of his. The wardrobe contained only her things and as she ran out of the room, darting across the hallway, she was already half expecting the result.

Nicole's bedroom was empty of her stuff, only the sparse furnishings of a spare room were laid out in front of her. As she turned again she saw a hooded figure in the corner of her eye, his familiar laugh echoing through the house.

And she woke with a start.

It was still dark and her eyes hadn't yet adjusted so she reached out to her side, letting out a small sob of relief when her hand impacted sharply with Peter's body next to her.

"You don't have to sound so happy about abusing me," he muttered, his sleep disturbed by his wife smacking him.

"You're here," she said, stating the obvious due to her confusion and state of sleep.

"Keep hitting me and I might not be." Peter rolled onto his side, settling back down.

"I woke up and you'd gone. You and Nic. There was nothing, no sign, no trace... And the Trickster..."

Peter fought against sleep to push himself up. "Sarah..."

"Today..."

"...is just another day," he assured her, putting his hands on her shoulders to pull her back down. "It was just a dream, Sarah."

"It felt real."

"They often do," he said.

"Sorry. About hitting you."

"Sure you'll think of some way to make it up to me," he smiled, closing his eyes.

Sarah watched him drift back off to sleep, eventually settling on his side. She curled in behind him and tried to go back to sleep herself but she was sure that she could still hear the Trickster's laugh.

* * *

**6.**

She woke from the dream without a scream, without sitting bolt upright, without a sound. She stared at the ceiling, trying to process what she'd just experienced. It didn't feel like a dream but she knew that it was. First clue was the fact that she was sat in the back of Peter's car. Second was the fact that around her thumb was Peter's wedding band.

The biggest clue was the fact that the Doctor turned and grinned at her during various points.

But this was more than a dream, this was...

_Don't fight this, Sarah_, the Doctor's voice had echoed in her mind.

_Why are you doing this?_ she thought back in response.

_Watch._

_

* * *

_  
She had known that it was more than a dream. Around the edges she could feel... control. Like she could reach out and move things, talk to them. She wasn't just witnessing the conversation between the Doctor and Peter, she was... a part of it.

"Doctor," Peter greeted, a note of caution in his voice. "Somehow I doubt this is about Sarah's birthday."

"What?"

"Her birthday. Next month."

The Doctor said nothing.

"Reset day," he said quietly. "Putting things back."

"Yes. But not like that."

"Why are you here?" Peter asked.

"You are supposed to die, Peter. Here. Today."

"Supposed to?" he questioned.

"Things have... changed," the Doctor said, tilting his head to one side. "I saw this as a possibility but until now..."

_Saw what?_ Sarah asked.

The Doctor turned his head slightly, as if he was looking at her, before turning back to Peter. "Ten minutes from now you should be heading back to Cambridge. And in eleven minutes' time Henry Jones, a sixty three-year old grandfather of three, will have a fatal heart attack. Or at least he should. He should crash, causing a pile up which would claim two lives. His and..."

"And mine," Peter finished. "You said should?"

"You and Sarah are on borrowed time. Twenty nine years from the moment you accepted this path. Yesterday was just when she went back, but now... It's been twenty nine years exactly since that day."

Sitting in the back, watching this unfold in her dream, Sarah couldn't help but check her watch. Lunchtime.

"In order to balance out, Peter, you should die. You died before and you should die again. But the Trickster... Henry will be given that choice, and like anyone would he will accept the chance to live. No heart attack, no crash."

"So what happens to me?"

"You live on. You and Sarah and Nicole and Luke."

"But? Then what?"

"I don't know," the Doctor admitted. "This moment sits on a pivot. It could go one of two ways depending on what happens now."

"What happens?" Peter asked, then he realised. "If I die or not."

"If you die then everything goes as it should. The Universe is righted."

"And if I don't?"

"The chaos and destruction..."

"What would happen to Sarah?"

"I don't know."

"Doctor..."

"I really don't know. There are some things that even I can't see, moments not yet finalised. They change with every second. Sometimes she's fine, sometimes..."

"She's not?" Peter finished. He inhaled deeply, gripping the steering wheel.

_Stop it,_ Sarah begged. _Please. I don't want to see this._

"I want you to know," the Doctor said, turning to face her. "You need to know."

_No, I don't,_ she replied. _My husband is dead. I know why and I know what happened. I don't need to see this._

"Sarah..."

"If I do this," Peter said, "then Sarah will be safe?"

The Doctor nodded.

"Nicole? She shouldn't even be here, should she?"

"I promise you she'll be fine." The Doctor reached into his pocket and pulled out a photo. Sarah couldn't see what was on it but it was enough to put a smile onto Peter's face. "They all will."

"Sarah won't," Peter said as he handed the photo back. "This is going to destroy her."

"It'll be hard..."

"I know my wife, Doctor," he snapped quickly. "She's been terrified of losing me and now..."

He stopped as his mobile began to ring. "Nic?" he answered.

_Please, Doctor. Why are you doing this to me?_

"Trust me, Sarah," the Doctor whispered.

_Trust you? I have had enough of bad dreams. I just want to sleep, Doctor. I just need to sleep..._

"You wanted to know," he said to her. "A part of you wants to know what happened that day."

_Not now. Maybe... I buried him today, Doctor._

In Sarah's mind the images of before flashed up. The Doctor arriving in her house the night after the wedding that wasn't, of him holding her as she suffered nightmare after nightmare, of visiting his grave.

"One condition," Peter said firmly.

"What?"

"I want to say goodbye. She deserves that."

_ENOUGH,_ Sarah screamed in her mind, closing her eyes to shut it all out. When she opened them again she was no longer in the car. She and the Doctor were standing in the deserted car park, no one else around.

"I wanted you to understand," he said.

"Understand what?" she asked. She ran her hands down her face in an attempt to stop herself from crying. "I buried him today. You brought him from here to the funeral... Why are you showing me this? Now?"

"Because you want to know," he said, putting his hands on her shoulders as she began to turn away from him. "Sarah..."

"Not today," she snapped. "Not now." She pulled herself free, turning around in time to see the ghost of a car pulling away. "It _hurts_, Doctor. It hurts just seeing you, having you here. And I'm sorry, I know that's unfair, but... I can't do this. I need time."

"OK," he said, walking up behind her.

She felt his hands on her shoulders before they ran down her arms. He rested his head against the back of hers.

"I'm sorry, Sarah Jane," he said quietly. "My Sarah Jane."

Sarah allowed herself to relax slightly, reminding herself that this was just a pause on their relationship. Time out to process everything, to deal with everything. She had a family that needed looking after and they had to come first.

"When you..." the Doctor began eventually, "just call. No matter when or why."

"I will," she said, turning around to face him. "I'm sorry, I wish I could deal with this without..."

"It's OK," he said, sensing in her thoughts what she couldn't articulate.

* * *

Sarah froze as she realised that it was still there, that sense of control on the edge. More than a dream, more than... She got out of bed and walked over to the window, pulling back the curtain just in time to see the outline of a familiar blue box disappear from outside her house.

Climbing back into bed she lay on Peter's side of the bed, pulling the covers around her, drifting off to new dreams. They started out as nightmares; being in the car with Peter as they crashed, over and over. The scenarios changed – on at least one occasion the car plunged into water and Sarah pounded on the door and windows in a vain attempt to escape.

But then it changed. She felt the edges of control again and as the dream reset she turned to her husband. "I love you," she whispered.

Peter still looked straight ahead at the bend in the road and the trees beyond. "I know," he replied, putting the car into gear.


	9. Wedding Planners

Chapter reference : sat in the middle of Ch 7 - .net/s/5723306/7/Second_Chance

* * *

More than once she caught herself thinking that it had been easy last time. Even if Peter was acting on instructions from the Trickster, all she'd had to do was go and buy a dress. Buy a dress, be ready for when the car picked her up, and just... turn up.

This time there were dates and venues and flowers and cakes and menus and colour schemes and bridesmaid dresses and cummerbunds and honeymoon plans and seating arrangements and families and invitations. Every time she thought one thing she felt like she was losing her breath, drowning under the arrangements that never seemed to end. All she wanted was to be married to the man she loved and she didn't care how or where or when. Not really.

Except that's not how she was supposed to be acting. As a woman it was expected that she should be obsessing over the smallest detail and that she should have an opinion on the different shades of blue that were being presented as options for the bridesmaid dresses. To be honest she could barely tell the difference between a couple of them.

She was able to deal with her aunt. Lavinia was still in demand for work and so she would frequently put a pile of papers in front of Sarah and ask for a decision after a few days. She would choose the first one that came to mind and pretend that she'd dwelled and debated and discussed the options and her aunt was happy.

Peter? Not so easy to deal with.

* * *

Things came to a head just under two months into the engagement. They were looking at potential reception venues and as far as Sarah could see that it came down to two options. One was within their budget, but for a little bit more they could have a more extensive menu option that would cater to more of their guests. So tonight's agenda was seeing if they could get the money from somewhere.

Sarah tried to feign interest, but the problem with marrying the love of her life, the perfect match? He knew her completely, inside and out. And even Peter Dalton had his limits.

* * *

"If you've changed your mind..." he began hesitantly as he watched her flick through the brochure for the tenth time.

"What?" Sarah asked, looking up from... She didn't know which one it was.

"Sarah." His voice was gentle but his eyes were filled with sadness and resignation.

"What?" she repeated.

"If you have changed your mind all you need to do is tell me. We can stop this now."

"Stop what?" she asked, genuinely confused until those sad eyes dropped from hers. "What? No. No. Peter, no, of course not."

"You're hardly giving the air of the excited bride."

"Hard to get excited about..." she began before realising how it sounded. "I mean..."

"I think I know what you mean," he said, pushing back his chair and getting to his feet. He walked into the kitchen and picked up the wine bottle. He sighed as he turned it over and nothing came out. "Figures."

"Peter..." Sarah said, coming up behind him.

"I understand. It's been really fast. It's just... I _knew_, Sarah. Right from the start I knew. You're it for me, and if you're not ready for this then I'm happy to wait."

"Peter..."

"And if... If I'm not it for you..."

"Stop it!" she said quickly, pulling on his arm to turn him to face her. Pushing up on her toes she kissed him gently. "I love you, Peter Dalton. I love you more than I could ever explain. And I want to be your wife. I really, really do."

"Then why...?"

"Because..." she sighed gently. "Because – and please don't take this the wrong way – I don't care. I don't care how or where or when. I don't care what I wear or what anyone else wears. I don't care what we eat and where we eat. I just want to be your wife, Peter. I don't care if it's in front of the whole world in Westminster Abbey, or if it's us in front of two strangers in the registry office."

"So what do you want?" he asked, running his hands down her arms. "Really?"

"You," she said gently, stepping forward and wrapping her arms around his chest. She smiled as he held her against his body, listening to his heartbeat. "I just don't see the point in... all that. Really."

"Want to know something?" he whispered conspiratorially in her ear. "Me either."

She giggled and gave him a gentle squeeze. "So what are we going to do? Lavinia's half expecting the full works."

"We'll just have to remind her that it's our wedding." There was a moment's silence. "Or we could work out a Plan B?" he asked.

"Think we might have to," she laughed.

"So. Back to basics, yeah? Think we can do better than a couple of strangers in a registry office, but we need to find something we are both happy with. This, Mrs Dalton-to-be, is going to be the start of our life together."

"I have news for you, Peter," Sarah said, pulling back to look up at him. "You and me? Already have a life together."

"Then it's just going to get better."

"Promise?"

He ran his hand down her hair and smiled. "You and me, love. Always."

She said nothing, holding on to him and her hope.


	10. Absenteeism

Placing : well, a lot happened for Nic in Chapter 26 - .net/s/5723306/26/Second_Chance

* * *

You sit on the edge of your bed and you try and make sense of the thoughts that are running through your mind. So much to deal with. The Trickster, Mrs Wormwood. You shouldn't be here, you don't matter. And your mother, the one person is supposed to love and protect you and make you feel like you count? She puts herself in front of your brother. You know she loves you but you can't shake this feeling that there is something else. Something is not quite right.

_The child who should never be._

_ Here you are unimportant. One among many._

You have a plan, an idea of how to sort all this out but you can't do it here. It has to be done on your terms and even though you love them to death you know that having them around is not going to help.

You find the lipstick in the attic and slip it into your pocket. It takes you a few moments to find the tracking chip your oh-so-protective parents put onto your car and with a few zaps of the sonic it's inactive. You return the lipstick to the house and pick up your holdall. Within minutes you're heading out of Ealing and by the time the sun comes up you've left London far behind.

* * *

You buy a new mobile phone and text Luke your new number, knowing he'll keep your secret. This way you'll know what's going on at home and you don't really feel like you've run away. Not properly.

* * *

You hope that you've found the right house – that weekend in Brighton seems like a lifetime ago. Since then you've dropped out of Uni and the others have finished, scattering back to their lives all over the country.

You had been celebrating the end of the first term and you'd caught the train to the coast, planning on staying at his parent's second home. You'd enjoyed a night out, ending up in some drag bar where he'd been hit on by the singer from the lead act. His girlfriend wasn't too happy and threw a strop, storming out of the bar to go back to the house.

In the end, you'd ended up taking him home. The two of you walked and talked, and you found herself giving him advice on what to say and what not to say. Telling her she was over-reacting was at the top of that list even though, yes, that was what happened. He'd put his arm around you and told you that you were great.

Of course he and Blondie had made up but since that night you and he had been close. He made you feel safe and valued and you need that more than anything else right now.

You climb the steps and ring the bell, and it's only when he opens the door you realise you're crying. You ask if you can stay the night and he just pulls you into his arms and holds you while you cry.

And finally, _finally_, you feel safe.

* * *

You wake screaming in the night – the dream real and vivid. You remember standing in the kitchen while your family and friends ignore you as if you weren't even there. When Luke walked through you then you realised that you _weren't_ there.

* * *

Scott is used to it now, he holds you while you settle from the nightmare. You mention that you feel better when he's there and that's when he makes the suggestion that tonight you sleep with him. Not _with_ him, but with him. You make a joke about Blondie not liking that and he tells you that he's single now.

Your heart beats a little bit faster and you climb in next to him and you have the best night sleep you've had in ages.

* * *

The police track you down because they can do things like trace your old Uni friends. You point out that you're over 18 and you're here of your own free will. You just don't want to go home. They're satisfied and you 'remind' them that they can't tell your parents where you are without your consent.

A few days later Luke warns you that they've hired trackers and you sigh. She really can't let go sometimes.

Taking some of the money you'd withdrawn from your trust fund before leaving you buy up some gold and when they arrive on your doorstep (pheromone tracking is pretty neat) they are easily paid off.

You are, you reflect, your mother's daughter.

* * *

It's a nice evening and Scott's decided to have a BBQ. You watch, laugh, and bring him drinks as he burns your food to cinders. He makes you laugh and you feel like you could spend the rest of your life here, with him. Only the calls you make to Luke each morning, eight am on the dot, make you feel guilty. Your mother isn't coping, your father... Well, you know he understands but Luke doesn't. And yes, you miss them.

But there are other things you need to deal with first.

* * *

This feels like home now. You buy a new wardrobe, get a haircut. You think about finding a job but that would almost be like saying you weren't going to go back and you can't make that decision. Not yet.

* * *

You're out in town one day when a sign catches your attention. It makes you laugh but you can't explain why the idea of having your fortune told is amusing when you feel like you shouldn't exist, like you don't matter. The woman comes out from the shop and she asks you if you want your fortune telling.

At first you say no – Scott is waiting for you, he's shouting you lunch. She asks again and there's something that makes you say yes. So you sit across from the woman who seems to look at you like she knows you.

She tells you that you're lost and a long way from home. She tells you that things have been changed and the consequences of that change will have repercussions for you. Then she tells you that you will be the salvation and suddenly you don't feel like laughing. You are meant to be here for a reason, she says, and the world stops turning under your feet.#

* * *

You're quiet on the walk back to the house. Scott takes your hand and you can feel your heart beating faster. You're not even at your street when he puts his arm around you and holds you closer. You stop dead on the corner and look at him.

"Nicole?"

"What is going on with us?"

"How'd you mean?"

"I mean... I spend each night in your bed. You hold my hand and you put your arm around me. I feel like I have every bit of a relationship without..."

He moves quickly and you finally register his mouth on yours. You can taste the lemon cheesecake he shared with you for lunch, or maybe that taste is in your mouth. Your heart beats faster and when your lips finally part they curl up into a smile.

* * *

You make dinner, you curl up on the sofa together, and you spend an evening _together_. When you go to bed you go as a couple and you take that step that moves you from close friends to something more.

When the sun comes up and pushes through the curtains it wakes you. You roll over and cuddle in next to him. Your brain is still foggy with sleep but you know that everything you left home to deal with has been dealt with. You have questions but they can wait. For now. You have a family who misses you and being here with Scott, curled up with him like this, puts that in stark contrast.

"What do you have planned for today?" he asks, his body feigning sleep.

"Think I might go for a drive," you say, thinking.

Last night you dreamt of a hill and there's one last bit of what the fortune teller said that is about to fall into place. You can feel it. Scott puts his arm around you and you know you that he's going to be a fixture in whatever future you have. Here, in this bed, you matter and you are everything to him. And that's enough.


	11. Stars

Relating to Second Chance chapters 6, 9, after 37 and 46.

* * *

He lies on his back, looking up. It's been a month since that day in the pub and he's thought about very little since. He never expected it to be like this, unable to think about anything else.

He'd mocked those books and movies that his female cousins and friends seemed to like. The one where two people fall in love and they can't think about anything or anyone else. Except he'd spent the last month trying to track down a beautiful brunette he'd had a long and fantastic lunch with. There was something there, something he couldn't place. Which included her name and where she was right now.

He comes here when he needs time away from the City. Not that he's supposed to admit that. He's supposed to be a focussed up-and-coming City lawyer with the world at his feet and work on his mind. Nothing but work.

He grew up just outside of London, only child because Fate had other plans to his parents'. He worked hard at school, put himself through University, found a placement, a tiny little flat that was almost an hour's commute from work but it was _his_. It was all his. He saw what he wanted, he went for it, and he got it.

He sighs, turning his head away from the bright lights of the City, trying to take in as many of the stars as possible. Somewhere, out there, was the woman he – cliché or not – wants to spend the rest of his life with.

"I'll find you," he vocalises. "I love you."

* * *

He's slightly nervous when he stops the car. This place now feels a bit stupid, a bit... insignificant. He'd built this night up so much that she's probably expecting pressed linen service with some guy in a penguin suit waiting on them, while a nearby string quartet serenaded them.

He glances over at her; she's looking expectantly around them, looking for something, and his heart sinks.

Then she smiles and his heart remembers that it should be beating. They get out of the car and he leads her over to the spot. She doesn't seem to be upset at this turn of events and now, more than ever, he allows himself to believe that maybe she is The One.

Yeah – he's living the cliché. Thankfully his cousins have long since moved away and he is at no risk of being mocked. Except maybe by the woman who's now looking at him with half amusement and half surprise.

He lays out the blanket for them and she settles in beside him, resting her head on his shoulder while he uses his free arm to point out the stars. He is making it up now but she either doesn't mind or doesn't know the difference. Either way she's listening and laughing and he's having the best time.

"I love you," he says suddenly. Last night she'd called it, she knew that he was in love, but this is the first time he's said it out loud.

She turns her head to look at him, smiling that smile that got her stuck in his head. "I love you too."

* * *

He thanks the driver and nearly trips over his feet as he tries to get out of the car. He walks past the car to where she's laying – he only just notices that she's not put the blanket down. She doesn't move when he walks over to her and so he lays down beside her, curling into her side.

"I'm sorry," she whispers and part of him wonders if she's talking to him or the stars.

He can't keep telling her that she shouldn't be sorry, the words have become meaningless these last few days.

"One in four," he whispers gently. "Just one in four."

The nurses were great, answered every question they had to the best of their ability, but at the end of the day they had been one of those three unlucky couples whose baby just... doesn't make it.

For days Sarah seemed to be OK, well, as OK as she could be. Then today she just disappeared. Lavinia, who in an almost uncharacteristic display of devotion, was calling every person of prominence that she could think of, demanding they mount a search for her missing niece.

He, on the other hand, knew exactly where she'd be.

"I know I shouldn't feel like this, but there are a few positives to this," he says quietly. "I mean, we got lucky pretty early on. Was looking forward to some trying."

She laughs, softly at first and then suddenly there's full on giggles. He gathers her body in against his and holds her as the giggles give way to sobs.

"We are not letting this beat us," he whispers. "We can't. We wait and then we try again." He waits until the sobbing has died down. "I love you."

"I love you too."

* * *

He pays the taxi and gets out, shrugging almost apologetically as the driver looks over at Sarah. He knows that the driver will be putting this down to baby brain, but he knows better.

He waits until the taxi has left and it's just the two of them before he goes over to join her.

"Nice night," he says, craning his neck to look up at the stars.

"Perfect for getting away from it," she replies.

"What have you got to get away from?" he asks, feigning ignorance.

"My overbearing family."

He sighs. "May I?" he asks, gesturing the blanket. When she shifts over a little he lays down beside her. "I'm sure your family mean well."

"I know they do. It's just..."

"Too much," he finishes.

Sarah rests her hands on her swollen belly, gently stroking the areas where her cramped baby was elbowing and kicking against its mother's body.

"Got long to go?" he asks.

"Few weeks. You'd think I was the only woman to have gone through this."

"Your first?"

"I never know how to answer that question," she admits. "In the eyes of... everyone, they were never really alive. No birth, no death, just nature. So technically this is my first."

"But you don't feel that way?"

"I don't know," she sighs. "Saying this is number five makes me sound like... Like I'm the prequel to 'The Sound of Music'."

"How's your singing voice?"

"Terrible," she laughs, her hand moving from her stomach to her side to find his. "I don't need my husband or my aunt telling me what to do."

"Sure she means well."

"My husband has no excuse. He's supposed to know me, know what I'm like. He should know I don't need wrapping up in cotton wool."

"But if this is number five... then there are four other times when it hasn't gone well..."

"And well before this stage."

"Doesn't mean things can't go wrong though. Sure he's just... cautious."

"He's driving me insane though."

"So you've left him?"

"Why do you ask that?"

"Wanting to see if my luck is in, and I can take this beautiful woman I've just met home with me."

"Even one who's prone to walking out?"

"I won't let it get to the stage where you feel like you have to walk out." He gives her hand a gentle squeeze and turns his head to face her. "What d'ya think?"

"One condition."

"Name it."

"You're going to need to help me up," she laughs.

So he gets to his feet and holds out his hands to her. She's heavy but he will lie until the day he dies and says she's as light as a feather. As soon as she's on her feet and steady she slips her arms around his waist and rests her head on his chest.

"Sorry," she mumbles.

"Me too," he says, kissing the top of her head in that way that she loves. "I'll be good."

"Be you."

"That I can manage. I love you."

"I love you too."

* * *

How they'd managed to get out of the house was a minor miracle, but here they were. Nicole had slept almost from the moment they'd put her into the car and she barely stirred as her still-nervous father lifted her from her car seat.

"You're sure about this?" Sarah asks, pushing the car door shut.

"What's to be sure about? Me and my girls," he smiles.

"It's late, she should be in bed."

"One night, Sarah. She should see this."

"She's not even six months old, Peter. She can't even recognise us across the room."

"But you still know, don't you little one? You still understand. What's up there, out there?"

"Peter..."

"Look at it, Sarah. You can't tell me that it's not wonderful."

She smiles at him and gently shakes his head, and not for the first time he wonders what it is she's keeping back from him. There are parts of his wife's life that seem... shut off, closed, but he has learned to accept them. He knows what UNIT is about, what they do, and he knows that Sarah understands more about the night sky than he does.

Than he wants to right now.

Right now he is standing with his baby daughter in his arms and he is showing her the stars. He just wants this to remain a thing of perfect beauty.

"It is amazing," Sarah agrees, and he catches her glancing at her watch. She puts her hands on his arms and applies enough pressure to indicate that she wants him to turn back towards the City lights. "Look."

Within seconds there is a large streak of light across the night sky, burning brighter than any comet he's ever known. Nicole's eyes, half closed in sleep, open wide and she seems to be taking it all in. Sarah puts a finger into her daughter's small hand and lets the tiny fingers close around it.

Peter knows that's not a comet or shooting star. He knows what it is likely to be and why Sarah knew where it would be and when. He just chooses to ignore the obvious because with Nicole in his arms and Sarah by his side this can just be a moment of perfect beauty.

"I love you," he whispers – to both his wife and daughter.

"I love you too," Sarah replies for them both.

* * *

He hasn't been up here in... He actually can't remember. He remembers the "comet" like it was yesterday but he's not sure if he's been here since. He knows that this is where Sarah came, where Nicole found her that day. This hill, facing out over the countryside in one direction, London in the other, was almost a symbol for his life and it was therefore fitting that they return here, today.

She had known where they were going early on into the journey, but she said nothing. Now they are here Sarah gets out of the car and waits while Peter gets the blanket. They lie down, side by side, looking up at the night sky as they had done many times before.

"Tell me about them," he asks for the first time. "Tell me where you went, what you saw, what you did."

She speaks quietly at first, keeping her eyes looking up. The clouds are drifting over the stars, blocking them from view on occasion, but she still looks up. As the stories go on she gains more confidence, telling stories (but not everything. If they make it through the next few days, if Peter meets the Doctor again, she doesn't want her husband attacking her oldest friend) with animation and asides.

When she has finished the tale of Eldrad, she looks at him. "What are you thinking?" she asks.

"All that," he thinks out loud. "All that wonder and beauty and adventure..."

"...and danger," she adds.

"...and excitement. Seeing a life that the rest of us can only imagine. Then you come home and you live a life, here on Earth... Then you go back and do it all again. I worked out how many years you've actually lived."

"Don't tell me," she laughs.

"Why not? I like the idea of being a boytoy."

"It's toyboy," she corrects gently.

"You settled for a family life when there was everything on offer."

"I didn't settle," she corrects again, this time a little more harshly. "I made my choices and I don't regret them. My life with you..." She rolls onto her side so she's looking at him now and not the stars. "I missed out on all this before. A husband, a child..."

"You had Luke, you were still a mum."

"It's different and you know that," she points out.

Neither of them are saying that Luke is not as important or as loved as Nicole, and they both know that, but they both know that it's _different_. Nicole had once explained to her brand-new-teenaged brother that their parents loved them in a way that they loved apples and pears. Both were fantastic in their own rights, both enjoyed in equal measure, but they weren't the same.

(Luke had then spent a week cataloguing his parents' fruit preferences for a month, confusing them when he had presented them with a spreadsheet which seemingly proved Sarah loved Luke more than Nicole, Peter vice versa. The Early Months were looked on fondly by some and cringingly by others.)

"Would you go with him?" Peter asks. "If he asked you again?"

"No," she says, a little quicker than she'd turned him down that second time.

"Why? What's out there... Why would you stay here?"

Sarah puts her hand on his chest in lieu of an answer.

"You chose this life this time 'round. Chose me. Why?"

"Because I loved you," she said, using the past tense. "Because... Everything that happened to me after I left the TARDIS happened to me because I met the Doctor. I met you because I met the Doctor. Because of what I did, what I do, all of it goes back to that day I stepped into the TARDIS.

"And yet after everything I have seen, everything I have done... I missed out on some stuff. Missed out on this."

"So you're just catching up?" he asks.

"No, I don't mean..." she sighs. She's not getting this right and she doesn't know how to put it into words. "I loved my life then and I love my life now. It's just..."

"Apples and pears?" he finishes.

"Yeah."

"Wish I could see what's out there."

"Who says you can't?"

"Bit late for all that."

"It's never too late," she smiles. "I could ask, next time I see him?"

"Any idea when that might be?"

The next time she would be due to see him wouldn't happen here, in this time. No wedding to burst in on, so she just replied in the negative and rested her head on her husband's shoulder.

"Probably a good thing," he says. "Not sure I like the idea of just... taking off and leaving the kids."

"They're hardly kids," she points out.

"You said it yourself, it's not all shooting stars and fantastic sights. If something were to happen... If I don't make it through the next few days..."

"Don't," she says quickly.

"...then they'll still have you."

"You're going to be fine," she says, willing herself to believe it. "I'm not losing you a second time."

He gently strokes her hair and he sends a silent thought up to the stars above them, hoping that she's right. "I love you."

"I love you."

* * *

She comes back after the funeral. Nicole and Luke are with her but the three of them don't talk at first. If they had cremated him then this would be where they scattered the ashes. But they didn't so they can't, instead they have just brought a blanket and stories. They lie back on the hill, children either side of their mother, and hands clasped they watch the stars come out and talk about better times.

Nicole points out a bright streak across the night sky, wondering out loud if it was a shooting star or a space craft. Luke knows that it isn't, but he likes the imagery and so doesn't tell his sister. Sarah knows exactly what – and who – it was, but she remains quiet too. As the night draws in and the cold creeps over them, she lets her eyes close and she tries to hear his voice in her head.

_'I love you.'_


	12. The Grieving Process

He stood back, watching from a distance. It would almost have been called respectful if it weren't for the fact that he knew he probably wouldn't be welcome. Only a few years ago he'd stood in this same spot, watching another funeral... Only this was different. This was Sarah's funeral. His Sarah.

"Beautiful day for it," came a voice from behind him.

He half turned, glancing at the woman who'd walked over to him.

"I thought you'd be over there."

"Don't think I'd be welcome."

"You were her friend."

"Yeah, and I..." he began, trailing off.

"It wasn't your fault. You and I knew the... reset had its limitations. The Trickster sought to abuse that, you just did what was best for her and her family."

The Doctor turned and stared at her. "You're her."

"Yes," she smiled. "But you knew that already."

"Why?" he asked.

"All the questions you have and that's the one you start with?" she teased, her eyes sparkling. "Ask me another and you'll still get your answer."

"OK, how? That kind of time manipulation is old school. To be able to do it..."

"Easy when you know how," she replied dismissively.

"But how? Those secrets were lost..."

"Everything that was lost can be found again," the woman said, turning to face the gathered mourners. "You just have to know where to look."

"Or when."

"Or when," she agreed, the corner of her mouth that he could see curling up into a smile.

"But how...?"

"You should be over there."

"You're avoiding the subject," he said.

"Sarah was your friend. Your best friend. All those companions, all those people that you travelled with... and it's Sarah who your thoughts go back to. It's her you talk about. Now that's probably because some of the others, well, that's too painful. Even if Rose is happy, it's not really you she's with. And Donna? Do you still think about her? Tempted to go back?"

"Who are you?" he asked again, his voice clipped.

"And here you are, standing in the shadows at her funeral because you can't bring yourself to walk over there. The Doctor. Running scared. And not just from Nicole, the girl you brought into the world. Surprised Sarah didn't ask you to be godfather. Sure she'd have asked Harry if he were around, but then I guess he is in a way. Even I didn't see that coming, but then again, I only gave her Peter. You gave her a family.

"The Time Lord Victorious," she quoted, echoing his recent words back to him. "I think this counts as a win. And you deserve a win."

"Who are you?" he asked again.

She turned to face him, her lips curling into a knowing smile and immediately he saw it, knowing it before she said her one word reply.

"Spoilers."

"But..." he began, putting it all in place. The eyes, the curl of the dark blonde hair. "How..." The woman stood in front of him was so similar to River that he almost kicked himself for not seeing it before.

"Spoilers," she repeated, winking at him. "The stories she told of you... I grew up with them."

"You're related?" he said, his tone that of a question but he knew it was a yes.

She said nothing more, only turned on her heel and walked away; he watched her until one word froze him to the spot.

"Doctor?"

He hesitated before turning around – he had hoped to be able to slip away without being seen. She was her mother's daughter alright.

"Nicole," he said carefully, eyeing her in case she went for him again.

"I'll be good, promise," she smiled, one hand resting protectively on her stomach.

"I was just going."

"No, please," she said quickly, shocking them both a little. "Stay. Please. It's funny, but I... I actually hoped you'd come. Just wasn't really expecting..." She gestured him up and down. "Wasn't expecting you."

"What?"

"Well that's how it works isn't it? Same you but new face?"

The Doctor blinked, his brow creasing in confusion.

"Sorry. Spoiler. Mum said if a man in a bow tie turned up then I should play nice. You're the only one she'd tell me to play nice with. I just thought..."

"A bow tie?" the Doctor asked, his nose wrinkling in disgust.

"Hey, some of us like them!" she protested. "I think they're cool."

"Since when have bow ties been cool?"

Nicole folded her arms, resting them on the soft curve of her expanding baby belly. "I like them. Made Scott wear one for the wedding. Mum admitted that they... they worked but if Dad had been there..."

Talking about her parents finally got to her, and she threw a glance over her shoulder towards the graves. A few years ago she'd stood almost on this very spot with her brother and said a final goodbye to their father. Now she was stood here with the same Time Lord but her parents were conspicuously absent.

"I'm sorry," he said eventually. "I wish..."

"It's fine," Nicole said quickly, moving closer to him. "Really. I mean, it hurts like hell and I'm going to miss her so, so much... But it's... I..."

She stopped as she locked eyes with the Doctor. When she'd met him before, and all the times her mother had talked about him, not once had there been anything about him crying. But now those deep eyes were filling up.

"It was a good death," Nicole said, saying the word for the first time. "Well, as they go that is. The Universe was going to balance out but she took my place. Because she died I'm still here."

"That's good," the Doctor said – a second later his face broke into a grin. "That's so Sarah."

"Yeah, it is," Nicole laughed gently. "My stubborn Mum. Always doing things her way."

"Always doing the right thing," he added, "even if the consequences... because it was the right thing to do."

"I'm glad you're here," Nic said. "Wouldn't have been right without you."

"I tried to get here earlier but the TARDIS wouldn't let me."

"But you were," Nicole said without thinking.

"What?"

"Oh hell," she breathed. "Look, I know it's all about spoilers and the new you but...

Mum had something with her, something only you could have given her."

The Doctor's breath hitched in his chest and he nodded.

"I mean it, Doctor. You and Mum... You two were OK, I know you were. She had a photo and only you could have given it to her. And when I came here to see Dad after... there were flowers on his grave. Flowers from a John Smith, saying he was sorry? You were there, Doctor. You were there, with Mum. And I know you two were friends. I know it."

The Doctor took a deep breath, fighting back the tears. Nicole's story gave him hope that his best friend hadn't gone to her grave hating him.

"And you know what? It actually helps. Knowing that you're going to see her again. It's like she's not gone completely. Not really."

"She's not gone," the Doctor said, fixing his eyes on hers. "Not while you're around and your baby."

"I am her," Nicole muttered. "Hope my kids won't be this stubborn!"

"They probably will," he laughed. "I'll check in every so often, just to keep my eye on them."

"I can't get my head around this," Nic continued, "I mean, there's going to be this other you in the future..."

"With a bow tie," he said.

"...but here you are, now. This you. The only you I've ever known. Mum, on the other hand, she... How many?"

"Too many to count," he laughed gently.

"She resets time, you know but don't say anything because... She had me because of you," she added, nodding in his direction. "All this happened because of you. Sorry, that came out wrong. I mean... She resets time, and you get involved because she wants a baby..."

"If I'd known..."

"You mean you didn't?" she laughed softly.

"If I had..." he began.

"Then I wouldn't be here," Nicole said. "I get it, I do. She meant a lot to you."

"You meant a lot to her."

"Yeah, I know," she sighed "My Dad dies to save the world, Mum dies to save me. If they were both here I'd kill them."

For a moment they both smiled at the image before Nicole burst into tears. The Doctor hesitated for a moment but then it was like he was looking at Sarah and his hearts couldn't take it. He pulled her into his arms, holding her against his chest.

"'s weird," she muttered as the tears subsided.

"What?"

"The heartbeats. Mum talked about it but..."

"She talked about it?"

"She talked about you a lot. Especially after Dad... After he died. She was mad at you, we both were, but once she got talking about you I could see everything just falling away. She forgave you." Nicole pulled back to look up at him. "We both did."

She was still close enough to the Doctor for him to feel when the baby moved.

"Here," she said, grabbing his hand and pressing it to her belly. "It never gets old."

"I can imagine," he smiled, feeling the baby turn. "That's amazing."

"Not like this for you? Time Lords I mean?"

"Not quite," he smiled.

"He's been really good today. Gentle stuff. Normally it's an elbow or foot in my bladder."

"He?" the Doctor asked, putting a hand on Nic's elbow and gesturing they should sit.

"Yeah. Calling him Peter."

"That's fantastic."

"Is it weird?" she asked. "Calling my son after Dad?"

"I think it's lovely. He'd be honoured, Nicole Dal..." He stopped. "Um..."

"Still Dalton," she said firmly. "It's Dad's name. It was Mum's. I know she was Smith to you, before, but to me... She was fantastic. I mean, that's not just me saying that as her daughter, she really was fantastic. She changes time, she has a life against all odds... All those miscarriages and she still decides to go through with it for me."

"Your mother was..."

"Stubborn?" Nicole laughed. "Between her and the flame-haired Scot..."

"Who?" he asked.

"Some girl Mum met at the hospital. She'd just found out about me, and after all the miscarriages she was scared... This girl talked to her and then Mum decided to just see the pregnancy through no matter what."

"That's something else your mum had in spades."

"What?"

"Courage."

"Hope I've got half that."

"You, Nicole Dalton, are the combination of your parents. Brave, head-strong and heart-strong."

"Scott says I got Dad's eyes but I also got Mum's heart."

"I think he's right."

Nicole leant over, resting her head on the Doctor's shoulder. This intimacy was new for them but it felt right. It felt like something she could share with her mum. "We're gonna have two girls after. Mum had the picture you gave her. A photo. Me, Scott, three kids."

"Right."

"Is it weird I want to call the first girl Sarah? Naming two of my kids after my parents?"

The Doctor put his arm around Nic's shoulders. "Your parents were wonderful people. I can't think of anything better. What about the other girl?"

"Dunno. Trying to think about names for a baby I'm having after the one I'll have after having this one? Scott thinks I'm insane."

"You're just your mother's daughter. Prepared."

"I want it to mean something. It has to mean something. Peter, Sarah... It has to..."

"What was the name of the Scot?" the Doctor asked.

"Oh, um... Amelia I think."

"Now that's a great name!" he exclaimed.

"Yeah. Amelia."

"You'll be a great mum."

"Hope so."

"You are your mother, Nicole. Remember?"

"I miss her," Nic whispered. "Her and Dad... the two greatest people I have ever known and they just... slipped away quietly for me. For their family."

The Doctor pressed his cheek against the top of Nicole's head and breathed in deeply. "I can't think of anything more amazing. Or more them."

Neither of them said anything further, just sat quietly in the summer evening.


	13. Logical Differences

There are moments that slip by unnoticed. Tiny, seemingly insignificant moments that set us up for bigger moments. The kind that changes lives. Little moments that influence the next. Whether to turn left or to turn right. Whether to say yes or no. Each moment ticks over into the next, events crashing into each other like dominoes in a way that they were always set up to fall.

Whether we knew it at the time or not.

* * *

Luke had always been a people watcher. In his early days it was how he learned, watching his new family interacting with each other, talking with his new friends. He would spend breaks and lunchtimes at school observing the other students, marking out the behaviours of each year group and social group.

Clyde had pointed out the geeks and the bullies and the sports crew. He observed each group and quickly determined the social relationship structure. He even took to watching the teachers on duty, identifying adult peer relationships in addition to those of who were closer to his supposed age.

People watching was his thing.

So here he was, people watching in his own home. An hour ago they had buried his father. And about 45 minutes ago he had hugged him and said a final goodbye which would normally be the wrong way to do it except nothing about his life had been what most people would consider normal.

There were the lawyers from the office. They had reverted to their comfort zone and were huddled together, discussing things in low whispers as if they were conferring with clients.

Liz and Alistair were sat on the sofa, the former fussing over the latter. Their children, in laws and grandchildren were the only ones eating the buffet spread that Nicole had channelled her grief and energies into. He could tell that Liz and Alistair had been to too many funerals of loved ones. They had seen too many people put into the ground before their time. They had buried friends and loved ones but this? This was different and he ached to talk to them about it. Alistair had been his mother's friend throughout both of her lifetimes, been a part of the world that led to this. Liz was a woman of science, of answers, and Luke needed those. He needed to know why all this had happened.

The Chandras were holding back, feeling slightly excluded from the personal world of the Daltons.

The Daltons.

Peter Anthony, Sarah Jane, Nicole Grace, Luke. A family unit. He started to watch his mother, trying to understand. There had been a whole other life, a whole other universe where she had been Sarah Jane Smith and he had been Luke Smith. A time when this happened somewhere else. To other people.

He knew that before his mother had grieved for Peter but he wondered if it had been like this. Her grief had been the basis for this whole existence after all. Here she had memories to comfort her. Photos, events, a biological daughter. All these reminders of Peter – his father – and his love for her.

He wondered what it had been like before, just the two of them. She had assured him that they were happy before, but it was a different kind of happy. But what was he like? Developing... no, growing up with a father and a sister would have had an obvious effect on him. How had he been before? What about their friendships and relationships?

Liz and Alistair had been a big part in Sarah's life this time by simple virtue of being Nicole's godparents. He thought about all the things they must have been to his family, playing a part in the life of this little girl, growing up in a world where she shouldn't exist. Sarah hadn't said anything but deep down Luke knew that before, in that other lifetime, she hadn't had much contact with them. So there was that then.

He watched Nicole walk into the room, moving on instinct and auto-pilot towards Scott. He understood how she was feeling, acting. Nothing seemed to be working under her control, her body did what it did by instinct. Breathing, blinking, movement. But no thought. Memories yes, but no thought. For him it was the first time he met the man who became his father. The man that Sarah Jane knew would be a father to him long before she knew he would be a father to their own child.

He also thought about the times they spent together, the father-son bonding trips Peter took him on in those early days. Nicole accepted her new brother, Sarah was filled with love she had carried with her for over twenty years. But his father? That had taken a bit of getting used to. He'd enjoyed the time they spent together. He wondered what effect having a father had had on him. His mother had told him that they were happy before, but this was... this had to be a different kind of happy.

He watched Scott wrap his arms around Nicole and he was struck by something but even his advanced brain couldn't hold onto it in his grief and it went as quickly as it came. Before there was no Nicole and therefore there was no Scott. Well, there probably had been a Scott but he wouldn't have Nicole. Another relationship that didn't exist before...

The moment of temptation washed over him and he wanted to know what it had been like. He wanted to see it, live it for a little while. Him and his mother in this big house. The two of them with their friends and their supercomputer, saving the world from their attic in Ealing.

His mother, quietly grieving.

When she walked into the room everything changed. Everyone's attention was diverted to her, every mouth spoke platitudes in hushed tones. Sarah nodded and was gracious but Luke felt like screaming on her behalf. Peter was dead, dead and buried and nothing anyone said or did would make that OK. After a few months she was hurting so badly she changed time. Now she had history and family...

Unable to bear it any longer he pushed himself from his position, half hidden in the corner, and took for the stairs. He tried to take them two at a time but slipped on one and crashed to his knees. A pair of hands placed themselves on his shoulders and turned him around. Through tear-filling eyes he was able to make his mother who then held him against her chest as he cried.

They sat on the stairs, joined by Nicole after a few moments, and the remaining Daltons spoke gently and secretively. Luke asked his questions about Before and Sarah answered them with honesty and heart. Then the conversation moved around and Nicole talked about Scott. In an unguarded moment of honesty she said that he was the man she was going to marry, have kids with, and that she was scared. Not scared because that kind of love and those plans can be scary, but scared because Peter had to die to balance the Universe so what was going to happen to her? Sarah gently stroked Nicole's hair and admitted she didn't know, but she knew that she and Peter lived every moment of their lives and that their daughter should do the same.

After a little while, Scott came up to join them, sitting two steps down from his girlfriend. He rested his head on her leg and smiled up at her. When she looked down at him she noticed the album he had clutched in his hand.

"Oh," he said when prompted, "um... Alistair was looking through it and..." He flicked it open to the page and lifted it up. "I saw him."

Sarah took the album, looking at where Scott's finger was pointing. Then she looked at the young man sat with her daughter and her heart stopped for a second, the same way it had done earlier that day when she's seen Peter standing by the TARDIS.

"But..." she breathed.

"Who is he?" Nicole asked, looking at the photo.

"Harry Sullivan," Sarah answered.

"My dad," Scott added.

The thought that had registered in Luke's brain came back, slotting into place. He'd seen the wedding photos before and the resemblance between father and son was obvious now.

"But your name's not Sullivan," Nicole asked in confusion.

"Dad went over to the States and met my Mum when he was there. They fell in love, she fell pregnant. They were going to get married but he disappeared. Some black ops or something. I was two months old at the time. Mum brought me back to London where she had family and met Dad... well, my step-dad technically, but he's the only dad I've known. They got married, he legally adopted me when Dad – Harry, was declared..." Scott stopped and looked up at Sarah. "You're her. The woman he..."

Sarah bit her lip and nodded.

"Small world," Scott laughed softly.

"Was he... happy?" she finally managed to ask.

"Yeah, he was. Mum talks about it all the time. They were happy."

"I'm glad," she whispered.

And then a smile broke onto her face – an honest smile with not a trace nor hint of sadness – closely followed by soft laughter. Nicole and Scott asked but she couldn't tell them, not now.

* * *

Before, in the time when she wasn't married to Peter having his daughter (and losing the others), Sarah and Harry had been friends. Good friends but nothing more. Then along came this operation in the States and after one last dinner he boarded a plane to Peru. Two days later he was officially missing.

This time he had gone to California after her third miscarriage. She'd had to place an international call to tell him about Nicole. He was happy for her, sounded happy and content with life. (Now she knew why – his partner was pregnant with his son, due to give birth herself in a few weeks' time.) She asked what he was doing for work and it had been something insignificant. Sarah had allowed herself to believe that this time he wouldn't disappear and said nothing more, but apparently that was supposed to happen just as much as Peter's death.

Her daughter and Harry Sullivan's son. There was something fitting about that.

* * *

Eventually everyone left and the family were left behind. The four of them – for Scott was now family whether he liked it or not – tidied the house, ate a small supper, and then went to bed to sleep the sleep of exhaustion. Keeping watch over the house were a tin dog, a Xylok in the attic, and a man in a pin stripe suit and a battered pair of converses, leaning up against an impossibly blue box.

* * *

It was not long before four in the morning when Nicole's cries woke her parents.

"I'll go," muttered Sarah. "She's hungry."

She shuffled through to her baby daughter's room, her eyes open just enough to see the major obstacles in her path. She lifted the bawling child from her cot and settled in the nursing chair to feed her. Nicole settled quickly, her needs met, and she fed hungrily as her mother gently rocked back and forth.

Peter brought a cup of tea in just as she'd finished, and he took the baby to burp her.

"Remember when nothing would get us out of bed?" Sarah asked as she cupped the hot mug. "Especially not at four in the morning."

"Things are different now," Peter smiled, rubbing Nicole's back gently.

"Yeah, they are," she whispered as she got to her feet. Sarah pushed a finger into Nicole's tiny hand, smiling as the fingers closed around it. "It's weird."

"What is?" Peter asked.

"Knowing that there's nothing I wouldn't do for her. Nothing we wouldn't do for her."

"For both of you," he corrected as he turned just enough to kiss his wife. "Go back to bed."  
"You have work in the morning, let me..."

"Go back to bed," he repeated. "You need to be rested to deal with her! Gotta keep my girls safe," he grinned.

Sarah headed for the door, stopping only to look over her shoulder at Peter gently soothing their daughter back to sleep.

It was a tiny, insignificant moment. No one saw it but them, no one knew about it but them. It was never spoken of again but that realisation stayed with them both until their final breath.


End file.
